The two provinces experienced a major drop in temperatures over the weekend, alongside the Free State and Eastern Cape.
On Saturday morning, several roads between Estcourt in KwaZulu-Natal and Harrismith in the Free State, and the southern parts of Mpumalanga and Gauteng were closed due to heavy snowfall.
Rescue operations continued on Sunday morning with dozens of people stuck in the snow.
SAWS weather forecaster Luthando Masimini said KZN residents are urged to take extra precaution when driving or walking as the snow melting is expected to make roads slippery.
“There’s not much expected for KZN tomorrow, no rainfall. We should start seeing some temperature recovery. With the snow that will be continuing to melt, we might see some cold conditions.
“On Tuesday, there is only a 30% chance of isolated thundershowers over the southern parts of KZN. Generally, it should be partly cloudy and warm.
Masimini said Gauteng temperatures are expected to start rising by Tuesday.
“In Gauteng we are expecting some cool to cold conditions in the south of Joburg and cool in the north of Pretoria up to Hammanskraal.
“On Tuesday, we are expecting temperatures to continue to rise with warm conditions expected. Probably, if anything cool, it should be in the extreme south Vereeniging, Heidelberg side. No rain is expected.”
Thania Dhoogra, Chief Operating Officer for the N3 Toll Concession, says the Van Reenen’s Pass remained closed to traffic on Sunday due to obstructions caused by abandoned trucks.
“The N3 Toll Route remains closed to incoming traffic between Tugela Plaza in KwaZulu-Natal and Harrismith in the Free State. All lanes are obstructed along a section of the route (from the town of Van Reenen towards the Swinburne/Montrose junction).
“This obstruction is caused by a large number of heavy- and light motor vehicles that are gridlocked across all four lanes. These vehicles, some of which have been abandoned by their drivers, have to be moved out of the way one by one to allow the graders to continue to work along this section of the roadway.”
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