Update: Franschhoek Fire 23 Feb 2019 – 10:00
The Cape Winelands District Municipality’s (CWDM) Fire Services and partners, CapeNature and Winelands FPA have made good progress toward containing the fire in the Franschhoek Mountains.
The night time weather, which was very warm and still caused the fire to spread into the dense vegetation around the Assegaaibos area during the night. The dense vegetation caused some difficulties, however the teams made good headway and the fire in this area is currently moving away from the denser areas.
The fire in the higher, less accessible areas are being prioritised for today, these are the remains of the original fire line, the high cliffs and rocky terrain makes them difficult to reach.
There are areas which have been contained, also referred to as ‘cold, ’ for the last 24 hours, the teams are keeping a close eye on these so that flare-ups are dealt with speedily. The fire has burned around 6800 hectares of vegetation.
Today’s resources number 170 fire fighters and ground crews, 14 vehicles and two helicopters. The helicopters will attend to the higher areas.
The Franschhoek pass is open to traffic, the fire services again request that the public refrain from trying to visit the affected areas, as this only puts extra strain on already limited resources.
The services again, thank the community of Franschhoek for the incredible support in the form of food, water, equipment and manpower.
Update 23/2/19 10:00: Franschhoek Pass to Hermanus andor Elgin now OPEN
Update: Franschhoek Fire 22 Feb 2019 – 13:00
The Cape Winelands District Municipality’s Fire Services together with their partners, CapeNature and Winelands Fire Protection Association continue to fight the fire that has been burning since Monday, 18 February 2019.
The fire is no longer a threat to the town or agricultural property, however all resources are now deployed to areas high in the mountains where sections of the fire are still burning out of control. Fire Fighters have been trooped in to these high areas by helicopters.
The fire team are making use of many resources to fight this fire, 140 firefighters, 22 fire vehicles and 3 helicopters have been deployed to try to contain the fire.
The fire line is currently made up of several broken lines, when added together is not less than 5 km, but no longer than 7 km. However teams have been deployed to areas where the fire line has been extinguished to continue beating to ensure that there are no flare-ups.
The fire has affected 6235 hectares of vegetation, not all of the veld is fynbos, a lot of the area is covered in what is known as ‘dirty forest’ in other words the areas is made up of alien vegetation and fynbos.
There have been no reported injuries.
The next update will be at 9:30 am
UPDATE: Franschhoek Fire; 22 Feb 2019 6:00am
The Cape Winelands District Municipality’s (CWDM) Fire Services can confirm that due to the immense efforts of firefighters the Franschhoek fire has been directed away from the borders of the town and agricultural areas.
A successful special operation to manage the fire with a combination of wetlines and backburning commenced late yesterday afternoon. Thanks to this precautionary measure, no damage to property, injuries or loss of life occurred.
The fire does however continue to burn in the high altitude areas where it poses no risk to life or property. These areas can now be prioritised and further management will be decided on at the incident command’s morning meeting.
A more concise update of the way forward will be made available after this meeting.
Next Franschhoek Fire Update: 10:00
Update: Franschhoek Fire 21 Feb 2019 – 17:00
The Cape Winelands District Municipality’s Fire Services together with partners Winelands FPA and CapeNature, has in response to the changed weather conditions had to revaluate their strategy.
The fire in the Franschhoek mountains which is being fanned by a south easterly wind is threatening to burn down into borders of the town.
To prevent this from happening, the fire services will undertake a special operation to backburn from the Franschhoek pass toward the oncoming fire.
The pass will serve as a firebreak while helicopters and other vehicles will create a wetline to prevent the backburn from burning out of control. The Franschhoek pass will be closed until further notice.
This is a recognised tactic to manage fires and was successfully implemented in 2010 when a fire with similar conditions burnt in the area.
The fire has already destroyed 5472 hectares of veld during its 96 firefighting hours. The total number of staff remains at 169 with support of a variety of 25 fire brigade vehicles.
The Fire services have requested that the communities should refrain from entering or visiting the affected areas as these spaces are strictly reserved for firefighting operations. They further wish to thank the community of Franschhoek for their overwhelming support in the form of foods and water, equipment and manpower.
Next Franschhoek Fire update: 7:00 am
Update: Franschhoek Fire 21 Feb 2019 – 6:30
Cape Winelands District Municipality’s Fire Services can confirm that the fire in the Franschhoek Mountains continues.
Late yesterday afternoon choppers and ground crews made good progress, unfortunately the wind increased and changed direction at 16:00. This caused the fire line above the Bohoek area to flareup and run down the mountain toward the farms, at 4:00 am the fire line was close to the farmlands.
Despite the best efforts of fire crews, the fire jumped the fire break in places and multiple properties are still in danger.
No damage to properties or injuries have been reported.
Today the 165 firefighters together with aerial resources will focus on fire line in the Bohoek.
Further crews will be trooped high into the mountains on the Mont Rochelle side to tackle the fire in difficult terrain.
Next update: 9:30
Update: Franschhoek Fire 20 Feb 2019 – 10:00
The Cape Winelands District Municipality’s Fire Services report that the fire in the Franschhoek mountain remains out of control. There were some gains and losses with regard to fire management during the night.
The potential for spreading of the fire line due to inaccessibility is 100%.
There is still a very large area that is at risk around the current burn scar. A total of 2800 hectares of veld has been destroyed so far.
Teams will continue with monitoring, controlling the fire line and mopping-up activities until the fire has reached the area where direct attack can be rolled out.
Total crews deployed are 189. There are currently 13 skid units and 8 fire tenders. Aerial support is on standby.
Next update: 14:00
Franschhoek Fire Update : 19 Feb 2019 – 12:00
The Cape Winelands District Municipality’s Fire Services can confirm that the fire, that started late yesterday afternoon in the Franschhoek Mountains continues to burn out of control. The fire team’s main efforts are focused on preventing the fire from spreading onto agricultural grounds.
The jagged and mostly inaccessible fire line is 9.5km in length, situated 3 km inside the borders of the Cape Winelands District. The Franschhoek pass remains closed.
There are currently 175 ground crew members from both CWDM, CapeNature and Working on Fire fighting the fire, presently there is no threat to property. Aerial support has been activated, there are five helicopters doing waterdrops in co-ordination with the ground crews.
The CWDM again, calls on all visitors and communities to be aware of the dangers of fires during this time of year and request that we all keep our firefighters in our thoughts.
Update: Franschhoek Fire 19 Feb 2019 – 8:00
The Cape Winelands Municipality’s Fire Services can confirm that the fire in the Franschhoek mountains is still burning out of control. The fire line is very long and jagged, making determining a solid line difficult. Many of the areas are inaccessible. The fire team will deploy ground teams to those areas that pose the highest risk of property damage.
The Franschhoek pass remains closed.
The Incident Commander and aerial support flew over the mountains as soon as light allowed to evaluate where the ground teams can be deployed safely; while having the best chance of preventing the further spread of the fire.
Temperatures are set to soar into the high 30°C today, the CWDM urges all citizens and visitors to be vigilant of fire causing actions and to keep our fire fighters in their thoughts.
Next update 11:30
Update: Franschhoek Fire 19 Feb 2019 – 6:00
The Cape Winelands Municipality’s Fire Services can confirm that the fire in the Franschhoek mountains is out of control and still burning. The fire line is very long, making determining a solid line difficult. Many of the areas are inaccessible. The fire team will deploy ground teams to the areas that pose the highest risk to property.
The Franschhoek pass remains closed.
The Incident Command will be flying over the areas as soon as light allows to evaluate to where the ground teams can be deployed safely; while having the best chance of preventing the further spread of the fire.
Temperatures are set to soar to 37°C today, the CWDM urges all to be vigilant of fire causing actions and to keep our fire fighters in their thoughts.
Next update 9:30
