We often associate water with peace...with calmness and beauty...
A little stream of water can bring relaxation...
But, water can also leave a trail of destruction...as we are currently seeing over the last couple of days here in Kwazulu Natal, on the East Coast of South Africa.
Photo by Katarzyna Gonsior on Unsplash
Over the past weekend, we enjoyed some cool, wet weather. We expected some cooler weather as it was expected that the first snow of the season might start falling in the higher regions of the country and on the mountains.
We enjoyed the cooler weather here after we've had some really warm days lately.
We had some light rain over the weekend...but nothing too serious.
And then, on Monday, it started raining... It came down in buckets...
When you look at the image above, it's beautiful. The water is where we expect it to be and we can enjoy the scenery and the power of the water masses in front of us...
But when it comes pouring down and it just doesn't stop, and rivers start overflowing, vehicles get swept away, people go missing, buildings start collapsing...it becomes something else. It becomes a nightmare...
I'll share some screenshots of scenes that came through on my phone on Whatsapp...
The first was one is a screenshot of a video taken by my neighbor close to where he is working.
The next is a screenshot of a clip from that video...
The next screenshot shows a tanker trailer floating down the Umgeni River (bottom image - I marked it in red) before it ends up in the ocean where the Umgeni River meets the ocean (top)...
I took this screenshot from the video and marked the tanker trailer where it is being tossed around in the surf...
It eventually ended up on the beach...
These three videos of the tanker above were taken by different people.
What you see in the screenshot below, used to be a road... You can still see the barriers in the background.
My daughter kept her sense of humor amidst all of this and sent me this...lol!
I have many more of these images and videos, but I don't see the need to share them all here. This is only meant to give you an idea of what is going on here at the moment.
The irony of the whole situation is that with all these masses of water coming down, we are stuck with no water at all due to damage to the infrastructure.
Fortunately, my eldest daughter still has some water at their house, so she helps out with water for us and my youngest daughter and her household.
Otherwise, all the neighbors are supporting one another with whatever we can.
Other than the water situation, we as a family are safe and we are very grateful for that.
We heard some gruesome reports last night which are very disturbing, but I do not see the need to go into that detail here. All I can ask is that you please join us in prayer for those people and families who have really been hit hard and who are really suffering as a result of these floods.
All I would say is that many cannot return to work yet, being cut off or trapped. Others have lost vehicles, homes, and even their lives.
Local authorities are in discussions with the government to get the necessary assistance and if I am correct the government has announced that the military will also be deployed to assist wherever they can.
And that is all from me for today, folks.
Except for blurring out names, no editing was done on any of the screenshots in this post. I just took the screenshots from my Whatsapp feed on my phone and shared them here.