Johannesburg - The South African Weather Service has issued a level two alert, warning of possible hail storms and severe thunderstorms in parts of KZN, Gauteng, the North West, Free State and Limpopo.
The warning from the weather service comes as Eskom also announced stage 2 load shedding from between 9pm and 5am on Thursday night until at least Saturday morning.
The weather service issued an alert on Twitter saying severe thunderstorms could occur in parts of the five provinces.
“Expected to develop over parts of the North West and Free State spreading to Gauteng, parts of Limpopo and Mpumalanga during this evening and continuing overnight into tomorrow morning,” the weather service said.
⚠️Severe thunderstorms may occur over a large area today (Thursday 07 October 2021). Expected to develop over parts of the North West and Free State spreading to Gauteng, parts of Limpopo and Mpumalanga during this evening and continuing overnight into tomorrow morning. pic.twitter.com/DEaSvLn8Rl
— SA Weather Service (@SAWeatherServic) October 7, 2021
Regarding KZN, the SA Weather Service also warned of severe thunderstorms in the north-western parts of the province from Thursday night.
In Mpumalanga and Limpopo, they said the storms would affect the south western parts of the two provinces.
“Strong to damaging winds, large amounts of small hail and heavy downpours, leading to localised flooding,” the weather service warned.
The SA Weather Service said the conditions across the country could lead to heavy downpours, hail, lightning, and strong winds, which could cause damage to cars, livestock and infrastructure.
The weather service also said the storms could cause the flooding of low lying roads and bridges, minor vehicle accidents, localised damage to structures and vehicles due to hail.
The weather service also said the lightning could cause possible fire incidents and also warned of flying debris because of the storm.
“These conditions coupled with high instability and ices are expected to result in scattered showers and thundershowers over the north western parts of case again.
“These thunderstorms are expected to start from this evening into tomorrow morning,” they said.
IOL