By Charmaine Boois
Mariental, 24 Nov. – The Ministry of Agriculture, Water, and Land Reform has warned members of the public, especially those living close and along the lower Orange River, of possible flooding in the coming few days.
In a statement issued on Tuesday, the ministry said they had learnt that the Vaal and Orange-Senqu River catchment basins in South Africa and Lesotho had experienced high rainfall development.
“As a result, this had triggered major overflows and releases had to be made from Bloemhof, Gariep and Vanderkloof dams over the past two weeks.
The high flows moved down the lower Orange River, peaking from two metres to 6.26m with a flow rate of 3 100 cubic meters per second, at Upington on Saturday, 19 November 2022.
Communities, water users, irrigation areas (Noordoewer, and settlement in Aussenker, mines, road users, the lowest part of the Orange River in the Oranjemund area, etc are advised to be on high alert for possible high river flows and flooding, said the ministry.
