{"id":295204,"date":"2025-12-11T15:56:36","date_gmt":"2025-12-11T13:56:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/?p=295204"},"modified":"2025-12-11T15:56:38","modified_gmt":"2025-12-11T13:56:38","slug":"at-natures-mercy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/at-natures-mercy\/","title":{"rendered":"At nature&#8217;s mercy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>Daily electrical storms over the Goldfields are akin to living on the Highveld. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>More than 230mm of rain has fallen over Welkom since the beginning of November. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Residents experienced two severe storms in November which caused hundreds of thousands of rands&#8217; damages. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"768\" data-attachment-id=\"295259\" data-permalink=\"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/at-natures-mercy\/hail\/\" data-orig-file=\"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail.jpg\" data-orig-size=\"1280,960\" data-comments-opened=\"1\" data-image-meta=\"{&quot;aperture&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;credit&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;camera&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;caption&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;created_timestamp&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;copyright&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;focal_length&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;iso&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;shutter_speed&quot;:&quot;0&quot;,&quot;title&quot;:&quot;&quot;,&quot;orientation&quot;:&quot;0&quot;}\" data-image-title=\"Hail\" data-image-description=\"\" data-image-caption=\"\" data-large-file=\"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail-1024x768.jpg\" src=\"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail-1024x768.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-295259\" srcset=\"https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail-1024x768.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/novanews.co.za\/vistanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Hail.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">On 21 November large hails stones caused a lot of destruction in the region. <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>During the second storm more than 30 old trees were uprooted by strong winds or cut down by lightening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Daily electrical storms over the Goldfields are akin to living on the Highveld. More than 230mm of rain has fallen over Welkom since the beginning of November. Residents experienced two 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