For anyone wanting to read more about this, here are some articles and data from the Climate System Analysis Group at the University of Cape Town.
This article explains the severity of the drought, and calculates that the return interval for a two-year drought of this severity is 1150 years (!), which mostly absolves the City of blame for not anticipating it: http://www.csag.uct.ac.za/2017/08/28/how-severe-is-this-drou...
This article explains the severity of the drought, and calculates that the return interval for a two-year drought of this severity is 1150 years (!), which mostly absolves the City of blame for not anticipating it: http://www.csag.uct.ac.za/2017/08/28/how-severe-is-this-drou...
Here, you can see an interactive plot of rainfall in Cape Town. Highlight 2017, 2016 and 2015 to see the reason for the current crisis: http://www.csag.uct.ac.za/current-seasons-rainfall-in-cape-t...
Addressing the scaremongering by the City around "the new normal": http://www.csag.uct.ac.za/2017/11/01/is-cape-towns-drought-t...
Describing the difficulty of forecasting this drought: https://theconversation.com/why-cape-towns-drought-was-so-ha...