South Africa’s main artery linking the country’s economic centre with its biggest harbour remained closed for the second day running yesterday.
The N3 between Durban and Joburg was bogged down with snow and black ice, making conditions impossible for the usually heavy flow of trucks and smaller traffic between the two centres.
To make matters worse, a truck jack-knifed, blocking the northbound side of the highway near Estcourt in the morning, causing traffic to back up on the highway all the way to Howick.
Several other trucks skidded off the road into the snowdrifts on the verges and were abandoned alongside the N3.
Late yesterday traffic had begun to flow with small cars diverted off the N3 near Estcourt and trucks kept standing on the N3 as traffic authorities waited for the black ice to melt.
Durban Chamber of Commerce CEO Andrew Layman said the impact on the country’s economy was the delay of exports and imports.
“This is disruptive to business and to the flow of the economy,” said Layman.
The regional general manager of the Federated Hospitality Association of Southern Africa, Warren Ozard, said the closure of the N3 had affected the long weekend for Durban’s tourism industry.
“We don’t have much information about the cancellation of bookings yet,” he said, “but obviously this has disrupted tourism.”
Road Traffic Inspectorate (RTI) spokeswoman Zinhle Mngomezulu said cars, trucks and buses were abandoned in the snow in the Kokstad, Matatiele, Franklin and Swartberg areas after their occupants were airlifted out of the cold by the army.
Trapped
Netcare911 spokesman Chris Botha said a team of rescuers operating in Kokstad and surroundings were continuing to help trapped people.
On SAfm radio’s AM Live current affairs programme at 7am yesterday a woman said she had been stuck on the N3 near the Mooi River Toll Plaza from 1am.
Motorist Colin Campbell, who was driving from Durban to the Drakensberg to fetch his son from boarding school, said there was still thick snow alongside the road.
“In some parts traffic was down to one lane which made progress very slow,” he said. On the whole, drivers were considerate and disciplined.
“But there is always that one idiot trying to overtake and weaving between cars to get ahead in a tailback that stretches 20km,” Campbell said.
Parents from Joburg on their way to fetch children from schools like Michaelhouse, Hilton, Kearsney, Treverton and the Drakensberg Boys’ Choir School were in |the traffic for up to 10 hours trying to get to their children so they could take them home for the long weekend.
Transport spokesman Kwa-nele Ncalane said graders were battling to scrape ice off the road, which was why the highway was kept closed.
Mngomezulu of the RTI said she drove from Pietermaritzburg along the N3 to inspect the situation and found trucks backed up for kilometres.
A snowdrift had also collapsed on to the road near Tweedie, blocking the road.
ER24 spokesman Derrick Banks said paramedics working with the Pietermaritzburg-based aid organisation Gift of the Givers and the police rescue and search unit had freed all trapped motorists along the N3.
Gift of the Givers manager Salim Sayed said most of those helped were truck drivers who were airlifted out of the snow.
Eskom continued to work around the clock to restore disrupted electricity lines which had left about 30 700 households without power in KZN and the Eastern Cape over the past two days.
