Fire death toll rises while blazes contained in Knysna, Sedgefield, Bitou and George

By late Sunday afternoon, there were no new fires reported in the Knysna area and no evacuations had taken place during Saturday night.

It has been confirmed that the mother of the four-year-old child, who died during the devastating fires in Knysna on Wednesday, 7 June, has died, reports the Knysna-Plett Herald.

The woman, a Malawian national, was reported as missing to the police after the body of the four-year-old deceased was found next to a dam at Narnia Village, Welbedaght.

A search ensued and she was later found in a critical condition at the Knysna Private Hospital.

Preliminary investigation confirmed that she was transferred to Tygerberg Hospital in Cape Town on Friday, 9 June, 2017.

An inquest docket was opened into her death.

Details of the deceased will be released at a later stage.

As reported earlier, on Saturday afternoon, a second volunteer, who was fighting the fire in Knysna, lost his life.

According to the Knysna-Plett Herald, on Sunday all national and municipal roads were open.

There were, however, a few fire flare-ups in and around Knysna and the fire near Sedgefield, that burned towards Buffalo Bay, still had an active fire line, but it was under control and posed no threat by Sunday afternoon.

All available aerial resources would focus on this line and they would attempt to extinguish it completely.

On Saturday night, the fire at Brackenhill jumped over the road, but had been brought under control and by Sunday afternoon, it was contained.

Fire teams from MTO were damping it down, and mopping up operations would commence shortly.

In the Bitou area, the situation had cooled down; however, an extensive area still needed to be dampened down.

Access to overgrown areas was being cleared by machinery in order to reach deep seated smouldering fire lines.

The 802 Fixed Wing Bomber from Working On Fire has been deployed, to assist with wet lines at the Kransbos plantation fire, near Uplands.

In the George area, all fires are contained, however flare-ups were observed at the Hoekwil/Serpentine Heights and Geelhoutboom fires. Firefighting crews were busy with operations in order to contain these fires on Sunday afternoon.

Mossel Bay Fire and Rescue were busy with firefighting operations in the Friemersheim area.

On Sunday morning, fire chief Reinard Geldenhuys, incident commander for the Knysna fires, said: “Today is the day; the day we win.”

This statement came during a media briefing, which included executive mayor of Knysna Eleanore Bouw-Spies and acting municipal manager Johnny Douglas.

In his statement Geldenhuys said that with the wind was dying down on Sunday this would “be the best chance we have had since the start of the fires to bring it under control and end it.”

“The aerial response is doing wonderful work. We are getting flare-ups here and there but we keep pushing back and will continue to do so,” said Geldenhuys.

According to him, there is a total of more than 1 100 people working in shifts around the clock to attend to all incidents.

This included pilots, emergency services personnel, fire fighters and volunteers. He said at the moment of the briefing that there were almost 350 people “on the ground”.

“All fires along the N2 are under control and the wind is in our favour,” he said, adding that no further properties were in danger at that time.

Bouw-Spies said for rebuilding purposes, there was a Knysna checklist that would be used to assess who is affected, what their needs are and where the needs are.

She said that supplies needed most at the moment are sleeping bags, mattresses, blankets, small home appliances and toiletries among others, and reiterated the importance that people do not spread rumours and fake news.

Bouw-Spies added: “Before this morning, I used to say we are cautiously optimistic about the fires. Today I can say I am very optimistic.”

According to Douglas, the total loss to Knysna has not yet been determined, but at the last tally which only included 5% of Knysna, 439 properties in town had been affected.

“We will continue to assess the damage tomorrow,” he said.

– Caxton News Service