Meteo Mauritius issued this bulletin at 4:30 am on Saturday:
The tropical depression evolving around 440 km northwest of St Brandon intensified into a moderate tropical storm early this morning and has been named ‘Belal’ by the Mauritius Meteorological Services. Active clouds associated with the outer bands of ‘Belal’ will influence local weather from this afternoon.
According to Meteo France, convective activity has picked up again, not only close to the low-pressure minimum, but also within peripheral bands with more curvature. These signs of intensification have led to the system being named BELAL as a moderate tropical storm, in coordination with the Mauritius meteorological service.
– The moderate storm BELAL is currently moving northeast of the island of Tromelin, just over 700 km north of Reunion Island.
– The meteor is expected to gradually intensify over the next few days, and will approach the Grandes Mascareignes (Reunion Island – Mauritius) this weekend.
– A passage as close as possible to these islands is currently forecast for late Sunday night and Monday evening. At this stage (around 3 days away), the uncertainties are still considerable, so it’s still difficult to say with any certainty how close it will come.
– BELAL is currently experiencing favorable conditions for its intensification. It is therefore likely to be a mature system, probably at the tropical cyclone stage (or even higher), which will be passing close to the sister islands.
– A gradual deterioration in the weather is thus forecast over the coming weekend, in terms of wind, swell and precipitation. A more marked deterioration in the weather is expected from Sunday evening onwards. In view of the current uncertainty regarding the forecast trajectory, this deterioration will be refined shortly.
