Reports of widespread damage are emerging from Mayotte after a 100-year cyclone ripped across the French archipelago Saturday, inflicting devastation that one resident likened to an atomic bomb, with hundreds and possibly even thousands of feared victims.

Mayotte, with a population of "just over 320,000," is "France's poorest island and the poorest territory in the European Union," The Associated Press said. But it has attracted tens of thousands of undocumented migrants, Reuters said, because it has a "higher standard of living" than Comoros "and access to the French welfare system."