Approaching cyclone or hurricane!

Tropical Cyclone Irina

The locals call these storms the snake with seven heads.

Kosi Bay and Mangusi town area is where the yellow spot is. The movement of the cyclone center is SW (which is the red arrow) at 6 mph.

That is just the movement speed not the speed of the rotating winds. This picture was updated Sunday 10:00 AM Mar 4 2012.

We've been asking people to pray about the tropical cyclone or hurricane or typhoon, depending on where in the world you are, that is hitting the coast where we are today. Kosi Bay is supposed to be affected the worst.

Last night the rotating arm of the cyclone crossed over us but we're still waiting on the storm center which originally was supposed reach the coastline this morning. But according to the satellite picture taken this morning at 3:00 it is still a little ways offshore. It's moving SW at 6 mph with wind speeds of 55 mph(approx. 95 kph). They say it's a category 1 hurricane so it is

not of the worst kind which we are very very thankful for. But it's definitely still very bad if you

live in tents because it can still rip the high sides of the tents and then drench everything inside.

Usually when the eye of the storm hits the coast it raises the ocean anything from 5 to 8 m. This pours into the lakes and causes a dangerous situation for people living close to the lake and there are many. This is also what causes most of the deaths when hurricanes hit a coast. By God's grace, we live by a lake but not a lake that is connected to the ocean but there are many people living by the four lakes in this area that are connected to the ocean which makes it very dangerous for them. We are next to an inland lake and although we are the closest people to the lake we are quite a bit above the high water mark.

We are camped at the red dot shown by the red arrow in this picture. The Mozambique border at the top is about 30 km from us.

As far as the winds, we don't feel the full strength of it because we are surrounded by big trees and thick underbrush and bushes which shield us from the winds very much. But last night we heard these trees shake and creak like we've never heard before because of the strong winds. Before the wind hits the tents we can hear it coming in the trees. I'm sure if they weren't here we would be paragliding. The danger is always there that the wind might break the trees but they are quite healthy and strong and young yet. Plus we trust the Lord.

Since this morning 7:00 we've been enjoying a very quiet calm. It is now 10:44 am. The last satellite photo taken at 3:00 AM shows a short break, a clear spot in the storm which is over us right now. But after that the storm center is supposed to start moving in today and according to the weather people it will last for two days.

Friends told us that there are some scientists and weather people from Pretoria who came for the 'great occasion'. I guess it's nice for those who study and research these phenomena but not so great if you're trying to stay safe, dry, clean and organized.

All the children's schooldesks are stacked on a heap in a dry spot, bookshelves are wrapped in plastic and tied down, poles are propped up everywhere to keep the roof from sagging and daming up and then ripping the seams out. Even under the tents there are still drips here and there from the airvents and seams. It's a fight to keep the storage tent dry. Our floors have shading net over the sand and this morning we had some cleaning up to do from streams of water that came in and deposited sand over the floor.

In normal weather conditions it is not that big of a challenge to live like this but with these prolonged and much more serious storms things quickly become a challenge. When it starts raining heavily and the winds start shaking you should see us run around, propping up poles, closing up tent flaps and whatever else needs helped.

We do have some lights and electricity that work from the Land Cruiser's battery system but when it storms so badly even under the tent the electric wires and sockets get wet and then we cannot use it so we are left with just little flashlights to run around with in the night, checking tent roofs and fixing tent sails that got blown out of place by gusts of wind.

We are very thankful for all the prayers that go out. This morning I spoke to brother Ignatius and I happened to mention 'it was not so bad' and the thought came to me, 'I say it as if we're just fortunate' and it struck me how easily one can say something not considering that there was much prayer going into potential problems. Hurricanes are never anything to play with or to take lightly. They can easily take on proportions that were never expected and no one can tell to what large extent prayer makes the difference. We can easily think ourselves fortunate but then are slack to directly connect it to prayer. Is that not why we so often fail to see the Lord's hand? The Lord is a God who hideth Himself and how often even His own children can miss Him because He is a God who hideth Himself. Although I detest it when people sacrilegiously connect the Lord with things they prayed for when you know their pathetic stand. That sort of thing even the world detests when they see or sense it and I do not want to be connected with such a silly testimony. So one tends to shy away and not mention the Lord when He did work on your behalf and this is wrong too. May the Lord get His due honour through our life. Praise be to Him for He is good.

Our open hand-dug well is still fine, thankfully.

Our toilet partly fell closed on the one side. It's the type of toilet some people call a long drop others call it an outhouse. In the USA people might find the name long drop quite funny I guess. Maybe 'outhouse' is a little more cultured or civilized. But in South Africa some people might think an outhouse is a storage room.

The lake's water level is the highest we've ever seen it but it's still not at the high water mark. There are seven hippos in the lake and they seem more at home than ever before.

In the twilight just before dark in the middle of the storm we saw a little fluffy bird sitting on a branch next to the tent. It was so calm and at rest even though there was a rough storm going on around it. It was such an encouragement to us that the Lord is in control of His birdies and their circumstances even in the roughest storm.

Another memorable blessing was the children's spontaneous singing even as we were having to rush around moving things out of the drips, packing away books, propping up the tent roof, preparing supper in the dark, etc. What a reminder to "Rejoice in the LORD always. And again I say, Rejoice!"