'A little war zone': Athens area cleans up after severe weather, downed trees on Thursday
A powerful storm raged through Athens Thursday evening felling several trees and leaving thousands across northeast Georgia without electricity.
“What occurred in the Athens area was straight-line wind damage,” National Weather Service meteorologist Ryan Willis said Friday.
“That kind of wind will do a lot of damage. We had numerous trees and power lines down all across that area,” he said, adding that the peak winds stretched from northern metro Atlanta down through the Athens area.
“That was unusual,” he said, explaining that the basic thunderstorm warning includes winds from 50 to 60 mph, which is the kind of winds that will bring down trees.
“The peak wind gust was 69 mph (registered at Ben Epps Athens Airport) and so that is unusual, and it’s unusual for this area to get an observance that high,” Willis said.
Athens-Clarke County police Lt. Jody Thompson said the storm caused numerous problems with a flurry of 11 wrecks occurring during and shortly after the storm. The storm also generated 58 calls to the police department regarding fallen trees, downed power lines and debris in the road.
“It was a busy night. Everyone was run ragged and we’re still running calls right now,” Thompson said.
Pine trees were snapped in numerous locations. An area at the Athens Perimeter exit at Lexington Road “looks like a little war zone,” Thompson noted.
However, the good news, according to Thompson, is that no serious injuries to people were reported during that time.
Thousands of people were left without power as trees fell in numerous subdivisions and along major roadways in Clarke County, but by Friday afternoon the majority of those originally affected had their power restsored.
Power outages across the Athens area
Georgia Power has already restored service to more than 225,000 customers and are continuing to engage additional resources for the effort, according to Georgia Power spokespaper Marie Bertot.
"We are also monitoring a severe weather system that has potential to impact Georgia this evening. We will continue to update our Georgia Power Outage Map with the latest information as crews are in the field," she said.
While power outages were still reported in Athens by late Friday afternoon, small cities around Athens also remained affected. Georgia Power reported eight outages in Winterville and four each in Watkinsville and Bogart.
Jackson EMC reported more than 20,000 outages in its service area, with most of those outages occurring in areas of Hall, Jackson, Gwinnett, Barrow and Clarke counties. By 4 p.m. Friday that number had dropped to 586 outages affecting about 2,600 customers.
The company called in 14 additional right-of-way crews to work on removing trees and repair outages, according to Jackson spokesperson Wendy Jones.
By 4 p.m. Friday, the number in Clarke County had fallen from 1,655 customers to about 400. By that same time there were 776 affected customers in Jackson County and 260 in Barrow County, according to Jackson EMC.
In Jackson County most of the damage from winds occurred from Jefferson south to Clarke County, according to Jackson County Sheriff Janis Mangum.
Traffic impacts of the Thursday evening thunderstorm in Athens area
During the storm and the aftermath, Mangum said there were 98 calls from residents along with six vehicle wrecks and four instances of downed trees on power lines.
Oconee County was to the south of the most powerful winds, but Oconee County Sheriff James Hale said there were numerous downed trees, including a large pine that fell on the power line near the sheriff’s office along Experiment Station Road. Traffic was shut down along that stretch until the tree could be moved, Hale said.
“It was a rough ride for a little while,” the sheriff said.
How the storms affected UGA, UNG operations
On Friday morning, officials at the University of North Georgia’s Oconee campus in Watkinsville announced that school has been cancelled for the day due to the power outage.
The University of Georgia remained opened, but UGA officials released a statement Friday urging motorists to be careful as several roads remained blocked by fallen trees, including sections of Field and Lumpkin streets. Some buildings were also without power.
This article originally appeared on Athens Banner-Herald: Athens storm damage caused by straight-line winds, not tornado, NWS says
