Firefighters have been battling to quell the blazes that started last week along the southern tourist trail.

“So far we have confirmed that there are seven fatalities of which one is woman who was eight-months pregnant,” Colin Deiner, head of Western Cape provincial disaster management services, told AFP.

He added that a baby was among the dead.

“They were trapped in Farleigh, it’s a small settlement in the mountains between George and Knysna,” he said. “That’s where we found the bodies today.”

Deiner said the fires have burnt around 16,600 hectares and had forced a precautionary evacuation of three suburbs, housing more than 1,500 people. DM