International aid began trickling in on Wednesday to areas of Tonga devastated by Cyclone Gita, as Fiji escaped the worst of the storm's fury.
Military aircraft from Australia and New Zealand flew emergency supplies to Nuku'alofa, which was battered early Tuesday by the most powerful cyclone ever recorded in the capital.
Fiji feared similar destruction when the tempest moved over its southern Lau islands early Wednesday, but initial indications were encouraging.
Fiji's maritime rescue centre said there had been no reports of casualties in the remote and sparsely populated islands, while state broadcaster FBC said three houses had been destroyed, along with plantation crops.
"At this stage it seems Fiji can count itself lucky in terms of the amount of damage," Fiji Disaster Management Office director Anare Leweniqila told the New Zealand Herald.
Meteorologists said the cyclone gathered pace as it moved westward out to sea and by early Wednesday reached top-of-the-scale Category Five.
But it is expected to weaken before skirting southeast of New Caledonia then dissipating over New Zealand next week.
The storm has carved a path of destruction through American Samoa, Samoa and Tonga since late last week.
It flattened the historic heart of central Nuku'alofa, reducing churches, stores and the century-old parliament building to matchsticks.
More than 3,000 people were sheltering in evacuation centres on the main island Tongatapu, where water and power supplies remain intermittent.
Tonga's military was Wednesday working to clear roads of debris and the international airport remained closed to commercial aircraft, although relief flights have been able to land.
A New Zealand air force Hercules transport plane delivered 12 tonnes of supplies, including tarpaulins, hygiene kits and water containers.
An Australian C-17A Globemaster flew in similar resources, as well as a team of disaster response specialists.
Among those counting the cost of the cyclone were the family of Australian rugby union prop Taniela Tupou, known as "the Tongan Thor".
The Brisbane-based Wallaby, who grew up in Tonga before pursuing his sporting career overseas, said his family home was destroyed.
"To simply put it, our house was completely destroyed," the 21-year-old said.
While the property damage was extensive, with emergency services estimating 40 percent of houses in the capital were affected, officials concede it could have been worse.
Police said only three people were seriously hurt and there were no confirmed deaths, although a 72-year-old man suffered a fatal heart attack possibly brought on by the storm.
Major cyclones in the Pacific have taken a higher human cost in recent years, with Winston killing 44 people in Fiji in 2016 and Pam claiming 11 lives in Vanuatu in 2015.
Philippines storm death roll rises to nine
Manila (AFP) Feb 14, 2018 –
The death toll from a tropical storm that struck the Philippines has risen to nine, officials said Wednesday, as some of the thousands of displaced residents returned home with floods receding.
Landslides and flash floods brought by Tropical Storm Sanba struck the main southern island of Mindanao on Tuesday and killed eight people, the civil defence office in the region said, doubling its earlier figure of four deaths.
"Most of the floods have subsided and all roads are now passable, but we have two people still missing from the flooding," civil defence official Mark Yap told AFP by telephone from Butuan city.
A baby also died on the central island of Leyte after a house was buried by an avalanche, the regional civil defence office sadi.
Sanba had forced more than 21,000 people to flee, mostly on Mindanao's east coast, the civil defence office in Manila said. However Yap said many had since returned home.
Sanba was bearing down on the country's western island of Palawan on Wednesday afternoon. But it had weakened after crossing the Sulu Sea and now had top gusts of 60 kilometres (37 miles) an hour, the state weather service said.
The archipelago nation is struck by 20 storms or typhoons each year on average, some of them deadly.
The country's deadliest on record is Super Typhoon Haiyan, which left more than 7,350 people dead or missing across the central Philippines in November 2013.
