The Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality is ready for any eventuality after the South African Weather Office issued a warning of persistent rain and flooding for tomorrow (Friday, July 13) and Saturday. A Joint Operations Centre (JOC), manned by municipal departments, Disaster Management, Fire and Emergency Services, South African Police Services and others, will be established during the course of tomorrow depending on weather conditions.
Boom gates were erected this week in the Newton Park, Third Avenue Dip area which will be closed when water levels rise. This stern action follows after motorists would indifferently remove barriers meant to close the road for their own safety and in the process putting other road users in harms way. Motorists are requested to be extremely cautious when approaching the dip area as the municipality is in the process of erecting more signs.
Residents in the lower lying areas are requested to store dry clothes and blankets in plastic bags that could be used when the need arise to relocate them to nearby facilities.
The Joint Operations Centre, when established, can be reached at 041 501 7980/1.
For regular updates during the weekend follow postings on the municipal Facebook page at Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality or tweets at @NMBmunicipality.
Editors Notes: The Weather Guru has moderated the forecast for this weekend somewhat but we all know what happens if a cut off low sneaks in so rather err on the side of caution going forward into this weekend.
Also I wonder how successful the Twitter and Vleisboek pages will be given our Communications Departments inability to find the reply link to emails sent to them by myself, at least!
