Reunion Island - latest tourist information
If you are looking for info on Chikungunya click here.
Volcano - eruption de la siecle?
To date - 14/04/07 the volcano continues its eruption and it is the most impressive and revealing for at least a generation. Revealing? Yes, in that the flow of lava in to the Indian Ocean has had the effect of bringing to the surface some 30 new species of fish - if this can happen around a small hot rock imagine how much more there is to learn of the whole planet before we completely concrete it over! See - the Journal for video on new species.
If you want to keep an eye on the eruption try the webcams of the OVPF, they have just installed a new one at the Piton des Basaltes.
Images from pros and amateurs areto be found on the excellent site - fournaise info
03/04/07 - The third eruption this year has seen a 500m fissure openning up on the side of the Piton de la Fournaise and yesterday (02/04/07) the lava flowed once more into the sea cutting in two the RN2 and generally amusing the masses. Unfortunately, I am not there ;-( being stuck in France in search of employment. However, some splendid photos can be found on the site fournaise.info and I am sure one of the island's papers won't mind if I tease you with one of their snaps :
Cyclones
CYCLONE JAYA 03/04/07
Not as exciting as Gamede but she is there none the less - Jaya is some 860km from the north west of the island and is tracking WNW at some 16km per hour
26/02/07 - Maybe not quite coming ashore on Réunion, Gamede certainly made quite a mess and reminded us all that a little humility before nature is not too bad a thing...
24/02/07 - Arrrrgh we've gone RED - so if things are a little quiet on the internet from Réunion youse all know why!
21/02/2007 - Gamede is nigh! We are currently on alert orange, the swell is swelling, the wind windy and...
With three cyclones currently passing throughthe Indian Ocean it is only a matter of time until one of them comes ashore on Réunion. Still, this makes up for last year and one cannot complain about cyclones for they are to the tropics what snow is to the alps...
Favio - skirted the island and eventually gounded in Mozambique causing loss of life and flooding. It was a near "perfect" cyclone in its form :
The first "officially" named cyclone of this 2006/07 cyclone season was BONDO, it had been tracked some 1200km from the coast of Réunion. It posed no threat and passed by northern Madagascar and skimmed Mayotte - another French territory in the Indian Ocean and well worth a visit.
It should have been "ANITA" but she was only a "moderate tropical storm", so you see that some of us just don't have what it takes!
2006/07 cyclone season map - meteo france
See the links on the CYCLONE page for satellite images and latest weather updates.
