By Vida Booyens
Light the fire, make your idombolo, nqushu and beans, and keep the newborn lambs warm, for a strong cold front is underway. The South African Weather Service warns that a period of extreme winter weather is beginning this weekend, with snowfall possible in all the provinces except Limpopo.
The Weather Service has warned that a particularly intense downward pressure system accompanied by severe and extreme winter weather is expected across the country in the coming days and could last until at least the middle of next week across the eastern provinces.
As usual, the cold starts in the Western Cape, and by early Saturday morning (7 June), this system will begin to affect the Western and Northern Cape. Then, by Monday and Tuesday, the icy weather moves further east across South Africa, making it the central and eastern provinces’ turn to start shivering.
Livestock farmers must protect animals from cold
A significant and drastic drop in daytime temperatures can be expected in all provinces, with the possible exception of Limpopo, according to the Weather Service’s warning. “As a result, livestock farmers are strongly advised to put in place appropriate measures to prevent livestock losses due to exposure to bitter cold and wind.”
A forecast of strong surface winds is expected to blow from Sunday, before the cold hits the interior. This creates an increased risk of wildfires, particularly across the central and eastern interior. These extreme conditions are expected to persist over some of the eastern provinces until Wednesday.
Strong to close to gale-force coastal winds and very rough seas are expected along the Cape southwest coast from Friday. The storm will spread to the southern and eastern Cape coasts over the course of Saturday and will last until at least Tuesday along the East Coast.
Heavy rainfall, which can lead to flooding and infrastructure damage, is expected over parts of the Eastern Cape coast and adjacent inland on Sunday. It will move to the south of KwaZulu-Natal on Monday.
Bitterly cold daytime conditions are expected across several provinces from Sunday, with maximum temperatures likely to be no higher than 10°C. Strong gusts of wind will exacerbate these conditions.
On Monday and Tuesday, there is also a risk of severe thunderstorms that may be accompanied by hail and damaging winds across certain provinces, including the Northwest, Gauteng, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal.
Given the intensity of the cut-off low pressure system, there is a small chance that light snow could fall over Gauteng and the Highveld of Mpumalanga on Monday night (9 June) and the possibility of snow continues until Tuesday.
At this stage, weather forecasting models still differ as to the true extent of the potential for snow.
Comrades participants also warned
For the thousands of participants in the Comrades Ultramarathon on Sunday, 8 June – this year from Pietermaritzburg to Durban – the Weather Service predicts mostly mild to hot and windy conditions, with partly cloudy to cloudy skies.
However, runners should be aware that cooler weather may occur later in the day, when a coastal layer and cold front are expected to move north along the KwaZulu-Natal coast and bring colder, more humid conditions to the coast and adjacent inland.
