{"id":646580,"date":"2026-05-11T09:54:28","date_gmt":"2026-05-11T07:54:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=646580"},"modified":"2026-05-11T10:26:06","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T08:26:06","slug":"national-disaster-declared-in-south-africa-after-floods-and-snowfall-photos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/trending\/646580-national-disaster-declared-in-south-africa-after-floods-and-snowfall-photos.html","title":{"rendered":"National disaster declared in South Africa after floods and snowfall \u2014 Photos"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Head of the National Disaster Management Centre (NDMC), Elias Sithole, has classified the recent severe weather events affecting several provinces as a national disaster.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The classification followed widespread severe weather conditions experienced since 4 May 2026, including heavy rainfall, flooding, thunderstorms, damaging winds and snowfall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The affected provinces include the Western Cape, Eastern Cape, North West, Free State, the Northern Cape, and Mpumalanga, where residents were displaced, and several people died.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

NDMC spokesperson Thabo Khupari told eNCA<\/a> that the declaration assigned primary responsibility to the Executive to reprioritise resources to provide relief and repair infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It also empowers other organs of state to assist in responding to the disaster,” Khupari said. “Mostly, the impact we have seen has been on infrastructure, like our roads.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Most of our dams are overflowing. We activated contingency arrangements and evacuated those who were at risk, saving lives.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to the SABC<\/a>, Ali Sablay from the Gift of the Givers said their teams were currently active in four of the six provinces where a state of disaster was declared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The first one was the Northern Cape, where there were many families affected near Upington, at the Dawid Kruiper Municipality,” said Sablay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said the organisation’s teams were successful in delivering food parcels and other humanitarian aid to those families.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the past week, many towns in Kuruman were inaccessible, with 82 areas completely cut off due to the weather, and the only access to the affected families was by helicopter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We delivered 2,000 food parcels to all affected areas on Saturday, with the help of the South African National Defence Force, Northern Cape Department of COGTA, and Social Development,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said their teams were also active in the Nelson Mandela Bay metro since Tuesday, near Gqeberha, formerly known as Port Elizabeth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We’ve been active in 32 centres, housing close to 3,900 families affected by floods,” he said. “We’ve been on the ground assisting them with immediate humanitarian needs.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Heavy impact on grant-dependent communities <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Residents of the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro receive relief packages from Gift of the Givers. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Gift of Givers also made its search-and-rescue teams available to the province and delivered vital aid to communities in Hankey and Patensie in the Kouga area.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We had a team active in the Southern Cape, from George to Knysna. They are currently in Oudtshoorn, assisting hundreds of families who are currently affected and cut off,” said Sablay.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“One challenging area currently for us is the area of Willowmore, due to the damage to infrastructure and roads being completely cut off due to rockfalls.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said their teams were unable to reach close to 210 families, who were completely cut off. One farmer has been communicating with the organisation’s teams.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“He is the last person with connectivity and is communicating with our teams in exact location pins,” Sablay said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Willowmore in the Eastern Cape had been without electricity since Thursday, and the town was 80% dependent on social grants and pensioners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Those dependent on the social grants could not draw their pension. The ATMs are all out of order,” Sablay said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Our teams moved in on Saturday to deliver, especially to the elderly and young mothers with children, the basic essentials of non-perishable food items, some baby-care packs, and hygiene packs.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said their teams would be stationed there for the next three days, providing hot meals to all those affected in the town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Great support from provincial governments<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Flooding in the Nelson Mandela Bay Metro. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Sablay also credited provincial governments for giving “great support” to Gift of the Giver’s teams, including the provision of vehicles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“All credit is due to the Nelson Mandela Bay metro disaster management teams, who gave us extra 4x4s and additional vehicles to move into those areas where the trucks could not go in,” he said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said the infrastructure damage from the recent severe weather had been significant, with not only small towns impacted, but cities too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We’ve seen the damage to roads in the Garden Route. We’ve seen the damage to roads in the Eastern Cape, in the Kouga Municipality. We’ve seen the damage in the North West, Mpumalanga, and Limpopo.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For this reason, he believed the declaration of a national disaster was a positive sign, as it would allow resources to be allocated to the affected areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“The town of Willowmore will cost millions of rand to fix up the electrical stations. And it’s not only that the floods had an impact on residents whose homes were washed out,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“There is an impact on whole towns and whole cities. We see damage to infrastructure. We see the loss of income in residents. We see people losing access to basic rights in terms of health facilities.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Too many South Africans living in dangerous places<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Velenkosini Hlabisa, the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Velenkosini Hlabisa, told SABC News<\/a> that a major problem was people living in floodplains and other areas unsuitable for human habitation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We need a bold, cooperative approach across different spheres of our communities, civil societies, and political parties to start requesting people on floodplains to relocate before there is a disaster,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hlabisa said the level of cooperation when early warnings were given must also be addressed. “People say: if we leave our area and property, people will come and steal,” he stated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We want to encourage our people that life must take priority. Even if you know you may not find your goods when you come back, you have one life.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hlabisa said that in most cases, lives are lost because people say they can’t leave their house, because they couldn’t take their most expensive possessions to the community hall.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We want to appeal to our people, those on floodplains, that they must take an initiative on their own, because they were not located there by the government,” said Hlabisa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He said municipalities cannot allocate land to people on floodplains. However, people in the informal settlements relocated closer to cities to look for a job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“They then find they put themselves in danger by residing in areas that are not good for human occupation.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Increased cooperation with early warnings<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Sablay said cooperation with early warnings had improved, likely because last year’s floods were still fresh in the minds of many Eastern Cape residents.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“In the past, people were very reluctant when these weather warnings went out. They did not even take heed of any of these weather warnings,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“When the level 8 warning came for the residents of Kouga and Nelson Mandela metro, surprisingly, the halls filled up rapidly.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said close to 4,000 people filled those halls, where in the past only a few were open. However, while lives were spared, the impact on them had been severe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“People going back into their homes are going to have to rebuild their lives. We saw the total destruction of people’s homes, food contaminated, their clothing and appliances all washed away,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Then we have those who are without electricity, those who are having to dump food, and those who have the means to buy but cannot buy food because there\u2019s no electricity.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sablay said there was a great need for non-perishable food items, clean drinking water, blankets, mattresses, personal hygiene-care item packs, and baby-care packs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The South African Weather Service issued further warnings for heavy rains, light snowfall, and extreme cold conditions in parts of the country, which may result in hazardous conditions, in the next week. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africans were encouraged to exercise extreme caution when going outdoors. In Cape Town, Chapman’s Peak Drive was closed due to adverse weather conditions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Multiple roads have been flooded and drains blocked across the metro. City teams have been activated to conduct impact assessments and clear affected areas,” said spokesperson Luthando Tyhalibongo.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“A collapsed roadway in Church Street, Bellville and a sinkhole in Atlantis have been repaired. Weather-related electricity outages were reported in various areas, with energy teams working to restore supply.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Photos of snowfall in South Africa during the past week<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Photos of flooding in South Africa during the past week<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Credit: SABC News<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
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Photos of disaster relief following severe weather<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Snowfall in Lesotho<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The National Disaster Management Centre has classified recent severe weather, which has displaced many people and claimed several lives, a national disaster.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":646606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40380],"tags":[105126,70686,44384,84231,39737,105132,105133,64991,84235,100846,14255,25029,105125,8957],"class_list":["post-646580","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-ali-sablay","tag-department-of-cooperative-governance-and-corporate-affairs-cogta","tag-eastern-cape","tag-elias-sithole","tag-floods","tag-gift-of-the-givers","tag-luthando-tyhalibongo","tag-minister-of-cooperative-governance-and-traditional-affairs","tag-national-disaster-management-centre-ndmc","tag-natural-disasters","tag-snow","tag-south-african-weather-service-saws","tag-thabo-khupari","tag-western-cape"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646580"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=646580"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646580\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":646662,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/646580\/revisions\/646662"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/646606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=646580"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=646580"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=646580"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}