The city's head of disaster management, Geoff Laskey, told AFP that hundreds of residents of informal settlements were given emergency accommodation overnight after their homes were flooded.

"About 400 people were dislocated from thier homes in Wallacedene, just north of the city," he told AFP.

"In Mitchells's Plain, 36 shacks were destroyed by floods, while in Nyanga township 15 shacks were washed away."

No casualties have been reported.

The Cape Town council has provided 600 meals, with about 260 people being forced to sleep in community facilities overnight.

"The weather forecasters are predicting that this will go on for the next day of so, which means another night of problems, and people suffering from the cold."

Heavy seas and strong winds were also slowing the salvage of a container ship, Sea Land Express, which ran aground on Sunset Beach, just north of the city, on Tuesday morning.

The SAPA news agency said residents of Cape Town's southern suburbs saw a dusting of snow on the buttresses of the mountain through an early-morning break in the clouds.

Operations supervisor of the Table Mountain cableway Peetie Harmse said just before 9am that it was even snowing at the lower cable station.

"It's very nice... spectacular," he said.

"At the moment we can't get to the top. We're just monitoring the wind," he said.

Media reports said on Tuesday that it was the first time in seven years that snow had fallen on Table Mountain.

The rains in the Western Cape province are a welcome relief for farmers.

A month ago the Western Cape government warned if it did not rain in the next fortnight the province could expect a drop of at least 50 percent on the annual average for all crops.

TERRA.WIRE