England star Danni Wyatt had a harrowing experience while traveling to the famous Table Top Mountain in Cape Town as her cable car lost power midway and left her dangling in the air. She is in South Africa with England team for the T20 World Cup 2023.
Wyatt and her teammates had joined tourists on the ride which sweeps over 1,000 meters (3,200 feet) up to the plateau above the city. She said that the cable car lost power due to load shedding in the middle of her ride.
“There were a few technical issues that made me very nervous before we boarded the cable car and then it decided to drop a little bit and swung. It was a very terrifying experience. I don’t think I’ll be going up that mountain again anytime soon.
I’m not going on that cable car ever again. It’s the load shedding, once the electricity goes, that’s it. Next time, I’ll take the stairs,” she said.
The Table Mountain Aerial Cableway, as it is officially known, opened in 1929 and carries around 900,000 people a year. The company said that a hydraulic system, which kicks into action during load-shedding, had suffered a technical fault on Wednesday.
“What happened is not what we aim for. We sincerely regret the experience that passengers had who were stuck in our cars. We are happy to confirm that all the passengers safely reached the upper and lower stations,” said managing director Wahida Parker.
Wyatt also said that she was heartbroken after going unsold in the Women’s Premier League (WPL 2023) auction which happened on February 13.
“I got back to the hotel and just wanted to stay in my room. I was literally heartbroken. The girls really got around me, which is really nice. Obviously, some people got what they wanted. Some people didn’t. I was just so proud of the way everyone handled it. I certainly felt a lot of love,” she said.
Table Mountain will form the stunning backdrop as Wyatt and her England teammates face South Africa in their World Cup semi-final at Newlands on Friday.
“We speak about wanting to break records. We’ve been given a licence at the top of the order to go from ball one. We’ve got the depth in the order to allow us to do that as well. Even if it’s going to be tricky conditions, we’re still going to keep going hard,” she said.
(AFP inputs)
