The severe thunderstorm - with heavy rains and large golfball-sized hail - lasted half an hour, but left lasting damage. Some trees and power lines fell, parts of roofs were blown off and windows and vehicles were damaged by the hail. Traffic guru Rob Beezy posted footage of roads awash with water and said "Pietermaritzburg: when the roads became rivers".
Businesses were forced to close with the South Africa Post Office tweeting that "due to heavy rain and flooding experienced in Pietermaritzburg (yesterday), the Mayor's Walk and Pietermaritzburg post office branches will not be operating (today) 23/12/2021."
Extreme Weather posted a video on YouTube calling it a "terrible storm". The weather site said that the flooding was "aggravated by the clogging of the storm sewer in Pietermaritztburg".
Freak storm turns Pietermaritzburg roads into rivers
Pietermaritzburg is situated almost at the Southern most tip of South Africa, there's cold air present there currently at 500hpa, hence the rather eventful downpour.
There's nothing freakish about it, today's technology has the ability to give folks the opportunity to see for themselves what's happening.