About 30 fires were ignited in mountain ranges across the Western Cape by a lightning storm in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
Spokesperson for Working on Fire (WoF), Val Charlton, said on Tuesday afternoon that the outbreak of these fires after lightning and thunder was ”a perfectly natural event”.
However, Charlton explained, normally storms were followed by enough rain to help put the fires out, something that had not happened after Tuesday’s storm.
Ground crews from WoF and municipal firefighters had contained and put out about half the fires and were still assisting on about 14 or 15 ongoing blazes.
Two fires in Tradouw Pass and Franschhoek remained of concern.
Charlton said an 80% chance of rain was forecast by Thursday and this would most likely help put out any last pockets of fire.
Manager for fire for Cape Nature, Zane Erasmus, said most of the fires were on old veld high up in the mountains.
From a biodiversity point of view this meant the fires were ”quite a good thing”.
Erasmus said what they were concerned with was that the helicopters of WoF were only contracted until the end of the month and this could be a problem if more storms occurred, especially because there had been little rain in the Western Cape this year. — Sapa