Wildfires cause havoc across the Waterberg
Sporadic flareups of wildfires have ccaused havoc in many parts of the Waterberg.
Sporadic flareups of wildfires have ccaused havoc in many parts of the Waterberg.
The Working on Fire (WoF) initiative said more than 5 000 hectares of land was lost in the flareups.
WoF Limpopo provincial spokesperson, Matema Gwangwa, said this on Tuesday 1 October, confirming that fires were still raging in many parts of the region.
These, she said, included Bukane near Alma, Sterkfontein Farm near Mookgophong, Swaershoek and Deelkraal farms outside Modimolle, as well as Bokpoort outside Mookgophong.
Gwangwa said Bukane and Sterkfontein were still affected by the flareups at the time of going to press.
She said that WoF has responded to 88 fires since the beginning of the 2019 winter fire season in the province.
Ground Operations Manager for WoF Limpopo South Region, Felicia Ngwasheng, said that they have seen a decline in the number of fires in the Waterberg District.
“Due to the intervention of the fire awareness campaigns that were run by the firefighters and the community fire awareness officer Mr Sello Matlhare, there has been a decline of wildfires in
the province during August, where only 27 wildfires were reported as compared to July that had 38 wildfires reported,” she said.
Matlhare said it is evident that communities are responding positively to the workshops WoF conducted and they are putting the precautionary measures to practice, because there has been a
marked reduction on the impacts of fires.
During the past week WoF responded to 12 wildfires of which seven occurred on Sunday 29 September.
“We are pleading with communities to report all wildfires to relevant emergency services in their area as soon as possible in order to minimise the damage that these wildfires cause in our society,” Ngwasheng said.
— The BEAT
