Accusations follow last week’s flames
"Hundreds of our animals were injured or dead."
MBOMBELA – A veld fire that spread to Valencia Seventh Day Adventist Church behind Valencia Wholesalers on Wednesday afternoon drew a crowd of onlookers as thick, black smoke was visible above the city.
Rumours quickly spread about what could be on fire, but it was confirmed that it was a large number of tyres in the church’s playground.
The owners of the church and crèche adjacent to the open lot which caught ablaze told Lowvelder that the fire brigade took more than an hour to respond to their calls. They said when a truck finally arrived, it did not have water or tools to connect it to a fire hydrant. These delays threatened their buildings, but the blaze was extinguished before any damage could be done.
Mbombela’s acting fire chief, Johan von Weidts, said he was not certain about the details of the particular case. “But it is highly unlikely that a fire truck would report to a scene without water or tools,” he said.
Von Weidts explained that although the public might think that firefighters were slow to respond when first connecting the truck to a fire hydrant, it is standard procedure to ensure a sustained water supply. He said he was not the first responder at the scene and will have to follow up on the allegations.
A fire set the cat among the pigeons between neighbours in the Croc River Mountain Conservancy this week, after some alleged that an attempt at burning a firebreak caused damage to neighbouring farms.
All fire permits were suspended and firebreaks banned last week Monday due to the high fire danger in the area.
On Tuesday at midnight, an attempted firebreak allegedly resulted in out-of-control flames which spread across a large area of the conservancy.
Farm owners, Christo Nel and Jan Sutherland told Lowvelder that they were alerted about it on Wednesday morning.
When Nel, who lives in Broham, arrived on the game farm he saw that three quarters of it had already burned.
“Hundreds of our animals were injured or dead,” he said. “We have various types of animals including buck, zebras and kudus which we hope had not all burned to death – and nyalas. I actually saw one of the nyalas burn.”
Initially the fire was contained to one side of the tar road leading to Kaapmuiden. Barend Janse van Rensburg was manning the side of the road when the flames crossed it.
“It was getting closer to my property. At that point it was so hectic that it was everyone for himself. We all had to do whatever we could to protect our properties,” he said. Residents fought for hours on end to curb the quick-spreading blaze. They managed to contain it yesterday morning.
Nel and Sutherland suspect that a neighbour, Ferreira du Plessis’ firebreak had caused the fire. He denied burning any firebreak.
