Facing hunger and thirst are survivors of Cyclone Chido , in French archipelago Mayotte in the Indian Ocean. Authorities are continuing to search for survivors in the wreckage and fears are being expressed of thousands of victims.

“The situation is devastating, apocalyptic,” Bruno Garcia, the owner of a hotel in Mamujou, the capital of Mayotte, told BFMTV. “We lost everything. The whole hotel has been completely destroyed. There is nothing left. It’s like an atomic bomb dropped in Mayotte,” he added.

Residents of Mayotte are calling the scenes “apocalyptic” caused by the worst storm in 90 years to hit the French Indian Ocean territory. Cyclone Chido brought wind speeds of more than 225km (225mph), flattening poor areas where residents lived in huts and sheet metal shacks.

“We haven’t had water for three days,” said a resident of the capital Mamujou. “Some of my neighbours are hungry and thirsty,” said another.

“Frankly, what we are experiencing is a tragedy, it feels like you are in the aftermath of a nuclear war… I saw an entire neighborhood disappear,” Mohamed Ismail, a resident of Mamujou, told Reuters.

Fears of thousands dead

At least 14 people have been confirmed dead by the French health minister, but the actual death toll is expected to be much higher, with local officials predicting the death toll could be in the hundreds or thousands, according to the Associated Press.

“I think there are a few hundred dead, maybe closer to a thousand. Even thousands,” said Mayotte prefect Francois Xavier Beauville

In Mayotte, about 75 percent of the population lives below the national poverty line, and one in three people are unemployed.