Firefighters battle to contain Cape Town blaze
More than 250 firefighters in Cape Town are battling a massive blaze that broke out on the slopes of the city’s Table Mountain on Sunday and spread to a university campus, forcing student residences to be evacuated.
Efforts to extinguish the flames were hampered by howling winds, with helicopters that are usually deployed to douse the flames unable to fly on Monday. Some residents of the suburbs of Vredehoek and Devil’s Peak were instructed to vacate their homes and schools in the area were shut.
Several historic buildings were gutted, including a tearoom at the Rhodes Memorial on Table Mountain’s lower reaches, and Mostert’s Mill, which was built in 1796. A thick pall of smoke blanketed large parts of the city, restricting visibility and making it difficult to breath.