TONGA – Tropical cyclone Gita hit Tonga overnight as a category four storm and the most intense to hit the country in 60 years.

Tonga’s emergency services say they are struggling to get out and assess the damage after Tropical Cyclone Gita left a trail of destruction overnight.

Roads all over Tongatapu are blocked by debris and downed power lines hampering relief efforts.

The eye of the cyclone passed just to the south of the Tongan capital Nuku’alofa and by 5am Tuesday was about 150km southwest of the main island of Tongatapu.

On Tongatapu, the category four cyclone brought winds of of 230kph, gusting to 278kph, which ripped roofs off houses, brought down trees, destroyed a Catholic church, and took the Tongan Met Office and the national radio station off line.

Tonga’s parliament building has reportedly been levelled by the storm.

Graham Kenna from Tonga’s National Emergency Management Office (NEMO) said the capital Nuku’alofa had been hit hard: “It was a terrifying night. I’ve been in-volved in disaster responses for 30 plus years and it’s the worst situation I have been in.”

“We’re on the third floor of one of the safest buildings in Nuku’alofa and the building was shaking and getting pounded by debris from flying roofs.”

There had been major destruction, Kenna said.

“A lot of the landmark buildings are extremely badly damaged or even destroyed. It’s quite a bad situation.”

The armed forces were rescuing people throughout the night, including a woman who was in labour and a man who was very badly injured.

The fact that there was no storm surge because the worst of the cyclone hit at low tide, and that the cyclone did not last as long as was expected were the only positive aspects, Kenna said.

The Tongan Advisory Counci said whole areas have been flattened by Cyclone Gita.

Its chairman Melino Maka told Radio New Zealand people in the eastern districts will have borne the brunt of the cyclone and should be urgently targeted with aid.

Homes, a school and churches have been flattened there.

“All the trees are down. I think so far there is no loss of life and I’m happy about that but I think as we go through the day we might start to see the full scale of the devas-tation,” he said.

Power and water supplies are out in Nuku’alofa and not even tank water was likely to be available because many tanks had been blown over, Kenna said.

Fiji’s MetService said the category four storm was very close to being upgraded to category five.

Kenna said the New Zealand and Australian governments had emergency supplies on standby and emergency funds were available.

“We can hit the ground running. We’re just dividing up our teams now so that as soon as we can get out there, we’re out doing an assessment.

“We’ll start in the city and then we’ll fan out into the countryside so we can get a full grasp by mid afternoon on what the needs are going to be,” Kenna said yesterday.

New Zealand MetService meteorologist Michael Martens said the eye of the cyclone passed just to the south of Nuku’alofa

“The eye didn’t directly go over the capital but probably more severe for them was the eyewall.”

The eyewall of the cyclone had crossed Tongatapu – “basically the worst possibly scenario for the main island”.

- PNC sources