Heavy smoke rises from Table Mountain in Cape Town
CAPE TOWN, April 19 (NNN-Xinhua) — Historical structures including a 300-year-old windmill and private homes were damaged by the raging fire that broke out on Table Mountain, South Africa on Sunday morning, which also injured at least two firefighters, authorities said.
The fire, which started at around 8:45 a.m. local time on the eastern flank of the Table Mountain in Cape Town, the legislative capital of South Africa, moved up towards Rhodes Memorial, which was in memory to British colonialist Cecil John Rhodes, before spreading to a campus of the University of Cape Town.
It is surmised that the fire was caused by the vacated vagrant after an initial investigation, according to the South African National Parks.
The Mostert’s Mill, a farm windmill built around 1796, was destroyed by the fire, the government of the Western Cape, where Cape Town is located, said in an update on the fire.
Several buildings of the university also have been affected, in addition to the Rhodes Memorial restaurant that has burnt down, said the update, adding that between 150 and 200 firefighters are on the front line, among whom two have been injured and taken to hospital.
The provincial government expected that the efforts to contain the fire will continue throughout the night.
The university’s library, the Jagger Reading Room constructed in the 1930s, caught on fire, while Cape Town mayor Dan Plato, through the city’s Twitter handler, revealed that some of the most valuable works in the library were saved by the quick activation of roller doors.
Although all the university students had been evacuated from the campus and visitors had been asked to leave the affected areas, the authorities said no local residents have been asked to evacuate except the students living on the campus.
The public has been donating essential supplies to help extinguish the fire. — NNN-XINHUA
