13.05.2026
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Disaster management teams in Cape to work through the night: Mayor

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  • A car is submerged in flood waters

Residents in low-lying areas affected by the ongoing storm in Cape Town will be prioritised in the city’s water removal efforts.

Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis says they have deployed disaster management teams to work through the night.

“It’s always our key priority to get the water away in those low-lying areas. Sometimes it’s very difficult to do so because they are very low-lying and so there will be some localised community flooding, but our teams will respond as best as they can. We have hundreds of teams, thousands of staff members, dealing with each of these things, one at a time, as quickly as possible.”

Hill-Lewis says strong winds have caused the most damage – including one fatality, after a tree fell over.

Hill-Lewis says they’ll continue to monitor the situation closely.

“We’ve had hundreds of trees that have fallen over owing to these extremely strong winds. Many of those are blocking roads, they’ve damaged property, knocked over walls and smashed into houses. So, that is very disruptive and taking a long time to clean up and will continue to take some time. Some trees have also knocked over some power lines which led to several areas being without power for several hours. Our electricity teams are responding as quickly as possible to get electricity services reconnected.”

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