Cyclone Idai sees hundreds of villages STILL cut off from aid weeks later, Ben Fogle says

I’m here.

Sleeping on the floor of a conference room at a destroyed hotel with several dozen exhausted aid workers from all across the world.

You see, it may have left the headlines but the humanitarian disaster here has not gone away, for many, it is only just beginning.

I am one of the only foreign journalists in Beira.

I joined a team from the Red.

Cross on an aid convoy to a small fishing settlement just 20km from the city.

Ours would be the first supplies to reach the small community.

It took us nearly two hours along a heavy potholed road.

Much of Mozambique’s transport network was destroyed by the cyclone.

Floodwater and fallen trees have paralysed the country.

It seems incredible that there are still hundreds of villages who have remained uncontacted since the storm nearly four weeks ago.

An assessment team who made initial contact, had discussed the emergency requirements with the shattered community and hundreds of shelters, tools, blankets and emergency kits had been sent.

It has been an incredible insight into worldwide collaboration of 48 separate aid agencies to ensure the millions affected are all reached.

A team of Red Cross volunteers from Mozambique, many of whom had lost everything in the storm, alongside an international team of volunteers carefully organised the distribution.

There was no chaos.

Preparation and planning had gone into a stunning orchestration of aid distribution.

Happiness, laughter and claps of relief as each family collected their shelters.

Among the survivors was 75-year-old Celeste. Her house destroyed, she sought shelter with her neighbour where she watched in horror as the wall collapsed in on her neighbour’s eight-year-old son, killing him.

They retreated to the church that also collapsed under the incessant wind.

She remained in the open for the night, bearing the brunt of the storm.

She Celeste is just one of the millions affected by a storm described by the United Nations as the worst weather related humanitarian disaster to ever hit the Southern Hemisphere.

Back in Beira I visited a field hospital build by the Red Cross in the grounds of the destroyed hospital.

After the initial rush of storm casualties comes the aftermath.

The infected wounds, the cholera, and of course, for mothers to be, birth waits for no storm.

As well as the 100 patients they see each day, they have been delivering five babies a day at this single clinic alone.

With the rising floodwaters from the storm, many were airlifted from their rural communities to temporary camps around the city.

Kids played football while mothers washed their young children.

Huge water ‘bladders’ holding 10,000 litres of water collected from local ground wells, clean the water through a double filtration system.

Local volunteers handed out hot meals while families sat outside their emergency shelters.

There is no chaos.

No anger.

Just sad resignation, ‘obrigado, obrigado’ smiled person after person ‘thank you, thank you’ they hugged the aid workers for the supplies and the support already offered.

But this is no quick fix.

You can’t put a plaster on it.

This is a massive relief effort that will take many months.

For the communities it will take many years to recover.

The disaster in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe May have left the headlines but it hasn’t gone away.

Money is running out and the international relief effort need more.

I have witnessed the beauty of hundreds of international humanitarian aid workers working alongside thousands of Mozambique Red Cross volunteers.

Beauty amidst the wretchedness of Mother Nature.

I’d like to think my children would do the same.

To learn the power of kindness, and the importance of helping others in the face of a natural disaster on such an unprecedented scale.