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A category two tropical cyclone headed to Vanuatu will significantly intensify by the time it is predicted to hit the Pacific Island nation this weekend, a local weather expert says.
- The cyclone is expected to increase intensity to category three or four
- It is not expected to hit Vanuatu's capitol, Port Vila
- Described as "severe", it comes after the end of the official cyclone season
"It is going to be severe, category three at least and maybe category four, but only time will tell," Neville Koop from the Nadraki Weather Service told ABC's Pacific Beat program.
"It's not going to be the same force as [Tropical Cyclone] Pam but it is going to be ... maybe even a little more intense perhaps, if you believe the forecasts that we're seeing right now, than Tropical Cyclone Cook about three or four weeks ago."
Cyclone Cook brought gusts of up to 130 kilometres per hour to Vanuatu in early April, felling trees and knocking out power to some residents in the Capital, Port Vila, but caused no serious damage.
Disaster authorities believe the cyclone, which is slowly moving over waters east of Vanuatu, will hit northern, central and southern parts of the cluster but miss Port Vila and other population centres such as Espiritu Santo.
In 2015, the powerful, category five Tropical Cyclone Pam ripped through Vanuatu with wind speeds of 250 kilometres per hour that killed 11 people and left around 75,000 in need of emergency shelter.
Shadrack Welegtabit, Director of Vanuatu's National Disaster Management Office, said contingency plans developed after Cyclone Pam had been put in place to make sure the public and emergency services were prepared.
"We have a lot of lessons to learn from TC Pam and we are already implementing recommendations from that, one of which is to ensure that we have good communications linkages," he said.
"And currently a lot of communications [are] still with the private sector and we are working closely with them so we don't lose those communications linkages again."
The official cyclone season in the Pacific ended on April 31.
Mr Koop of the Nadraki Weather Service said while you could never attribute the impact of climate change to an individual event, it was worth nothing that sea temperature had risen by a degree and a half above average in the western pacific.
"Vanuatu seems to have drawn the short straw in recent years in regards to cyclones, they've had way more than their fair share and this will be just another pause for them in the attempt to recover," he said.
Topics: storm-disaster, cyclones, cyclone, vanuatu, pacific, asia