The storm proceeded to make a clockwise loop over the country for the next several days, while dumping prolific amounts of rainfall in the region, before re-emerging into the Mozambique Channel on 16 February.

[3] The next day, the system was designated as an overland tropical depression, while bringing locally heavy rainfall across portions of southern Mozambique.

[8] Around that time, Guambe had a secondary low-level circulation center over northern South Africa, which slowed the storm's southward movement.

[11] Over the next several hours, Guambe began undergoing rapid intensification, with a well-defined central dense overcast (CDO) configuration developing, as the cyclone continued becoming more organized.

[12] Guambe quickly reached tropical cyclone status at 06:00 UTC on 19 February, with the appearance of a very small eye on infrared satellite imagery and a well-defined core structure, even as the storm turned southwestward.

[13][14] Soon afterward, Guambe reached its peak intensity, with 10-minute sustained winds of 155 km/h (96 mph), and a minimum central pressure of 953 millibars (28.1 inHg).

[18] Guambe further decayed as its rainbands unraveled and its cloud tops warmed, brought on by high wind shear and cool sea surface temperatures.

After Guambe's precursor disturbance moved ashore in Mozambique on 12 February, the storm proceeded to produce prolific rainfall across the region for the next several days, leading to widespread flooding, and displacing over 27,000 people.

[23] The mysterious deaths of 186 Spinner dolphins off of Bazaruto Archipelago National Park was thought to be blamed on Cyclone Guambe.