The South African Weather Service has issued a warning for fire over the central and western interior of KwaZulu-Natal. This is due to the hot and windy conditions.
Temperatures in some areas will reach as high as 32 degrees Celsius.
Forecaster Ayanda Nsele says the temperatures will start dropping from Monday.
“On the outlook for this week, basically there’s nothing significant, no precipitation is expected for the next 7 days. The highlights of the weather just before today, we do have an alert warning for high fire danger rating over the western parts of the province, which is mainly due to today’s hot and dry conditions as well as the windy conditions over that area. Today, temperatures are mainly warm Durban at 29, Pietermaritzburg 18, Richards Bay 32 and Ladysmith 27 – generally warmer. We are expecting them to cool down from tomorrow.”
Small scale farmers plead for assistance
Small scale farmers in Klipgat near Ventersdorp and in Boons near Rustenburg are pleading for assistance after about 6 000 hectares of their seven farms were burned by wildfires.
After a year of good rains, they were hopeful for good produce, but most of it has gone up in smoke.
The farmers say they watched helplessly as their 5 000 hectares of grazing land and another 1 000 hectares of their crop farms were in a blaze.
In the video below, Klipgat small-scale farmers plead for assistance following wildfires:
