Death toll from Cyclone Batsirai in Madagascar jumps to 111

Mauritian oil tanker Tresta Star, stranded off the coast of Reunion Island, at Le Tremblet, place of the 2007 lava flow, near Saint-Philippe, after the Batsirai cyclone hit Madagascar and the area on February 6.

The death toll from Cyclone Batsirai in Madagascar jumped to 111 on Friday from 92 reported earlier this week, the state disaster relief agency said. The cyclone hit the Indian Ocean island late on Saturday, slamming the southeastern coastline before receding late on Sunday. The disaster relief agency said that of the deaths, 87 had occurred in one area, the Ikongo district in southeast Madagascar. It said earlier this week it was still collecting details about what had happened in Ikongo. Batsirai was Madagascar's second destructive storm in two weeks, after Cyclone Ana killed 55 people and displaced 130,000 in a different area of the country, further north. The island nation, with a population of nearly 30 million, was already struggling with food shortages in the south, a consequence of a severe and prolonged drought.