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Auxilia Katongomara Chronicle Reporter
TSHOLOTSHO district administrator Nosizi Dube has raised concern over the increase in lightning strikes  in the district which have left three people, 18 herd of cattle and six goats dead this rainy season.Speaking on the district’s flood and disaster preparedness yesterday, Dube said lightning had become a cause for concern.

“As Tsholotsho district we’re very ready based on last year’s experience. We launched a disaster preparedness plan and we trained all wards in the districts on all disasters that might befall them, ward by ward. We recently faced a disaster after 11 people died in Botswana and we managed to bury them last week,” said Dube.

The district is also a flood prone area although there is no immediate danger in this regard.

Dube said instead of floods, the district had recorded an increase in lightning incidents.

“The first incident struck in Ntulula area in Ward 3 where a bolt of lightning struck a kitchen hut, mysteriously threw out two minor children and killed their parents,” she said.

Dube said after the two children, aged nine and three, were thrown out, they watched helplessly as their parents burned to ashes.

The couple, Nkulumo Ndebele and his wife Junior Sibanda’s ashes were buried in a grave on the spot of the incident.

Dube said in another incident in Ward 19, an old lady was burnt to death after being struck by a bolt of lightning while in her hut.

The lightning bolt threw out her grandchildren who survived the strike.

“In Jimila area, lightning struck seven head of cattle and six goats. Two brothers lost 11 beasts which they had earmarked for a cattle breeding project”.

The latest incident occurred on Saturday when a woman lost about $30,000 in cash and property worth thousands of dollars when lightning struck her homestead and reduced everything that was in the house to ashes.

“We do not know how to assist people who would have lost property and beasts in such incidents,” she said.

Dube, who is the district civil protection unit chairperson, said they launched a safety programme in some schools and were working on spreading it to all parts of the district.