THE DAY THE BEES ATTACKED

This Mpumalanga family spent six days in hospital after an angry swarm tore into them

- JACQUES MYBURGH

IT WAS supposed to be a relaxing fam­ily outing, a way to explore a pristine part of nature surrounding their home during a holiday break.

The only sign of potential discomfort, it seemed, was the boiling Bushveld heat – and that was easily beaten by waiting until later in the day.

Carl Pretorius, his wife, Jorina, and their three daughters piled into the fam­ily 4x4 so Carl could show his girls the nature reserve surrounding their home on a farm outside Mbombela.

They couldn’t have known that real danger lurked on the horizon.

They were on a dirt track they’d used often. “That was when we saw this mas­sive black cloud,” Jorina tells us. “At first, we thought it was a swarm of flies.”

But the cloud turned out to be a swarm of ferocious bees.

As the swarm inched closer to the ve­hicle, Carl (32) was the first to feel a sting. “We aren’t supposed to be around – we should actually have been dead,” Carl says.

The family is talking to YOU at their home a week after their nightmare encounter.

“I don’t know how we managed to sur­vive,” he adds. “We had hundreds, even thousands, of bee stings. Our bodies were grey with all the stings.”

Jorina (28) moves around slowly, her arms pocked with red patches where she was stung. Their young children – Rojandi (12), Joané (6) and Lienta ( four months) – weren’t spared.

Though the swelling has subsided on the older girls, little Lienta still has stings on her feet.