Floods wreak disaster in South Africa’s winelands

Dubbed a once-in-a-200-year event, extreme flooding in the Western Cape wrought destruction across some of its wine regions. Malu Lambert reports.

On what is traditionally the weekend that South Africans go outside and ‘braai’ in honour of the country’s Heritage Day, a cataclysmic flood literally washed away any such intentions. A level-nine storm began on the afternoon of Sunday 24 September and lasted late into the following day. According to the Cape’s Department of Infrastructure, early hydrology calculations have indicated that a storm this extreme happens just once every 200 years.

Now, two weeks after the event, the extent of the damage is becoming clear. At least 11 people have lost their lives. Widespread destruction across the province includes flooded homes, destroyed infrastructure and devastated crops. More than 80 roads were closed, and many remain so, especially in farming and wine-producing areas. For South African wine, the event is impacting both wine tourism and exports, as producers are unable to transport their wares to the harbour for shipping.

One of the closed roads is the MR269, better known as the Hemel-en-Aarde road [where Jancis visited just last May], a scenic thoroughfare that winds past all the famous estates of the same-named ward, one of the last being Creation Wines.

Further west, in Elgin, 11 dams burst their walls (many of which were around 80 years old), which has caused more major flooding in lower-lying areas in the valley, flooding orchards, roads and electricity and pipe infrastructure. ‘We got 230 millimetres [9 in] of rain in 24 hours’, said fourth-generation farmer Paul Clüver, who is the managing director of his family’s brand. ‘This has resulted in significant runoff and landslides never seen before by anyone still living. The main river running through De Rust burst its banks, taking out all bridges on the farm and flooding roads, main pipelines and apple orchards.’ The village is still without clean running water.

Perhaps surprisingly given the magnitude of the storm, Clüver and many others report no significant vineyard damage. James Downes, proprietor of Shannon Vineyards on the Palmiet River, is grateful for the timing of the rain. ‘Thank goodness the Chardonnay had just budded, and everything else was coming into bud, so it was still early on’, he said. What’s more concerning now, at the beginning of the growing season, is the saturation levels of the soils. ‘We will need to control vigour.’

In neighbouring Bot River, Sebastian Beaumont of Beaumont Family Wines said, ‘This was like no flood I have ever seen in my 49 years of living on this farm.’ The bridge from which their farm gets its name, Compagnes Drift, has been lost, as well as six hectares (15 acres) of fruit orchards. ‘We are trying to preserve the remaining orchards [about 5 ha]. These are key to our total business balance and will have massive long-term effect. Short term is the challenge of repairing the blocks and roads on the farm.’ The vineyards, however, have survived. The issue now is high disease pressure: temperatures are hovering around 20 °C (68 °F), with high humidity and more rain predicted. Currently they are spraying by hand as the soils are too wet for tractors.