Cold rainy days and dark nights are back again. Capetonians need to prepare as both an intense cold front and load shedding are on the cards for Wednesday, September 2.

On Tuesday night [September 1] Eskom announced Stage 2 load shedding would pick up again from 8am to 10pm on Wednesday, September 2 due to the continuing severe generation supply constraints as a result of multiple unit breakdowns.

“Ten generation units at seven power stations suffered breakdowns in the past two days. With the unreliable and aged generation infrastructure, together with a number of risks on running units, there is a high probability that additional stages of load shedding may be implemented at short notice,” the embattled power utility said in a statement.

“Unplanned breakdowns amount to 11 425MW of capacity, adding to the 4 983MW currently out on planned maintenance.”

The Cape will also face an intense cold front on Wednesday, bringing strong gale force winds, rainfall and thunderstorms in some areas across the Metropole.

The South African Weather Service (SAWS) issued a weather warning for Wednesday, saying: “Severe thunderstorms leading to localised flooding is expected over the Cape Metropole, Overberg, south-western parts of Cape Winelands and southern West Coast District,” in a Facebook post.

A cut off low is expected to affect the Western Cape and Northern Cape provinces on Wednesday. The public and small stock farmers are advised that very cold conditions and rough seas can be expected.

“Cloudy, windy and cold to cool with isolated to scattered showers and thundershowers, but widespread along the south-west coast into the adjacent interior where localised flooding is expected. The wind along the coast will be strong to gale north-westerly, reaching strong gale south of Cape point at times.”

The Cape Town Weather Office warned that wind speeds may reach up to 90km per hour and rainfall of up to 40 millimetres can be expected in some areas.

Some lucky locals will even experience snow. According to Snow-Forecast.com, the Matroosberg Nature Reserve is due to welcome 1.6cm of fresh snow on Wednesday, September 2. This is predicted to take place after 2pm.

Source: Cape Town ETC