Strong winds are wreaking havoc around Port Elizabeth, already causing a crane at the Port Elizabeth harbour to collapse.
In other parts of the city, overhead signage boards have been blown away along the M4 Settlers Freeway and boarding around the old Post Office opposite the Feather Market Centre collapsed on cars parked in Baakens Street.
Rose Rawstron took a picture of the collapsed crane from her flat on the 17th floor of The Beaches in Humewood just after getting back from gym at 7am.
“When we left for Virgin Active in Humerail at 6.15am there was no wind but it came up about 20 minutes later and by the time we left the gym to run back home - about 6.50am - it was hectic,” Rawstron said.
“It was getting scary.”
South African Weather Service spokesperson in Port Elizabeth, Garth Sampson, said the wind picked up at around 6.30am.
“The wind increase in speed over a relatively short period could have been a contributing factor to this happening,” he said, referring to the crane toppling over.
Sampson said the wind speed recorded at Shark Rock Pier went from 18km/h and gusts of 36km at 6.30am to gusting at 76km/h in just 15 mins.
By 7.45am, it peaked at wind speeds of 53km/h and gusts of 103km/h.
The official maximum gust at the Port Elizabeth International Airport was 102km/h.
Gusts are sudden, brief increases in wind speed. “This is by no means a record for Port Elizabeth. The maximum hourly wind speed was 87 km/h) and occurred in July 2002, while the maximum gust was 139 km/h and occurred in August 1991,” Sampson said.
“The wind is expected to continue to gust in the region of 95 km/h until 2pm and 75 km/h until 8pm tonight, when it will start abating.”
The South African Weather Service has warned of “damaging winds” of between 35 and 50 knots and high seas of up to 9m between Plettenberg Bay and Port Edward likely to continue during the day.