27 July 2007
This morning, many of the shacks in the Kosovo informal settlement in Philippi were swamped with water and few owners were around.
Kosovo has been hard hit by the weather, with some of the shacks flooded since Wednesday.
In the Greenpoint informal settlement in Khayelitsha, Sipha Mandla Yakobi was one of thousands of residents who spent much of last night baling water from their tin shacks and scarcely slept.
Neighbour Nozi Bele Sidzumo said: "The drains are blocked and so the water just kept on rising in the street. The rain was so heavy that cars were flooded."
Residential areas, especially in the southern suburbs, were hit by flooded roads, and structures", such as garden walls, were damaged.
At one stage more than 40 traffic lights in the city area were out of order due to the wet weather.
In Somerset West, a number of upmarket homes were flooded by torrents of water running down the streets from the slopes of the Helderberg mountain, as stormwater pipes overflowed.
Parts of Rusthof, in the Strand, were badly hit by the rising waters.
The Eerste River broke its banks in the Firgrove area, flooding the Vergenoegd Wine Estate vineyards.
City Metro Police spokesman Searle Johannes commended motorists for their "excellent" behaviour on the road during early morning peak hour today, with only minor car accidents reported by 9 this morning.
At Bhongolethu Primary in Philippi, more than half the children stayed away and those who were at school shared desks in combined classes.
At Nobantu Primary in Gugulethu, most of the pupils arrived at school.
However, deputy principal Doris Gobile said they were forced to send all grades one to three pupils home because several of the foundation phase classes had flooded.
Snowfalls were reported in Ceres before sunrise this morning. "It started at about 6am. There's lots and lots and lots of snow - it's a couple of centimetres thick!" said Didi Greeff of the Matroosberg Nature Reserve.
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