SUVA, FIJI // Relief supplies began arriving in cyclone-devastated Vanuatu on Sunday as the Pacific nation declared a state of emergency amid reports entire villages were "blown away" when a monster storm swept through.
The official death toll in the capital Port Vila stood at six, although aid workers said this was likely just a fraction of the fatalities nationwide.
The UN had unconfirmed reports that the cyclone had killed 44 people in one province alone and Oxfam said the destruction in Port Vila was massive, with 90 per cent of homes damaged.
Vanuatu's president Baldwin Lonsdale described the storm as "a monster that has devastated our country", his voice breaking as he described Port Vila's devastation.
"Most of the buildings have been destroyed, many houses have been destroyed, school, health facilities have been destroyed," he told the BBC from Japan, where he was attending a disaster management conference when the cyclone hit.
Communications were still down across most of the archipelago's 80 islands, and the airport in Port Vila reopened with limited facilities, allowing much-needed aid in.
Two Australian air force planes landed with supplies of food, shelter and medicine while a New Zealand military aircraft also arrived loaded with eight tonnes of tarpaulins, water containers, chainsaw packs, generators and water.
Commercial flights were scheduled to resume on Monday.
The government said it was still trying to assess the scale of the disaster unleashed when Super Cyclone Pam, a maximum category five system, vented its fury on Friday night, with winds reaching 320 kilometres per hour.
Pictures from the city showed streets littered with debris, cars crushed by trees, buildings blown to pieces and yachts washed inland.
"This is likely to be one of the worst disasters ever seen in the Pacific, the scale of humanitarian need will be enormous ... entire communities have been blown away," said Oxfam's Vanuatu director Colin Collet van Rooyen.
"People have completely amazed me," said Mr van Rooyen. "I've seen people walk away from totally destroyed houses and help others."
Vanuatu police commissioner Colonel Job Esau said some areas of the capital had been put off limits in a bid to stop looting as darkness approached.
"Facilities, installations, private sectors, and also from the yachts that have been washed away by the cyclone," he said.
Aid workers described scenes of devastation following what Unicef spokeswoman Alice Clements said was "15-30 minutes of absolute terror" as the cyclone barrelled into the island.
"People have no water, they have no power, this is a really desperate situation right now. People need help," she said.
Ms Clements said most of the dwellings on Port Vila's outskirts, largely tin shacks, stood no chance.
World Vision spokeswoman Chloe Morrison said the situation appeared grim for the outlying islands in the nation of around 270,000.
"We're seeing whole villages and houses blown away," she said.
The Fiji-based head of delegation for the Red Cross in the Pacific said she spoke with a man who flew a light aircraft Sunday into the southern island of Tanna, home to 34,000 people.
"He said all the corrugated iron structures he saw in the western part of Tanna were destroyed and all concrete buildings were without roofs," Aurelia Balpe said.
"All foliage was destroyed, there was no water and there were unconfirmed reports of two dead. Shelter and food are the major issues," she added. "We are still struggling to understand the number of casualties."
Save the Children's head of humanitarian response Nichola Krey raised fears of food shortages in the subsistence economy and said conditions in evacuation centres were challenging.
"Many of the evacuation centres have lots of women and young children sleeping cheek-by-jowl, so health and protection will by key in the coming weeks," she said.
Ms Clements said the hospital had also been flooded and most of its medical supplies were compromised.
Despite the problems, relief began to trickle in, a day after Mr Lonsdale made an emotional call for international aid at the Japan conference.
* Agence France-Presse
Cyclone Pam: aid trickles into Vanuatu in the wake of 'monster' storm
Vanuatu's president Baldwin Lonsdale described the storm as 'a monster that has devastated our country'as he described Port Vila's devastation.
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