Storm cleanup continues; cold storage trucks available for affected residents' food

Greg Bailey, Gadsden Times
·3 min read

As Alabama Power Co. worked Saturday to restore service to areas pounded by a severe thunderstorm Thursday afternoon, the City of Gadsden arranged cold storage for those concerned about losing food.

A refrigerated truck (for cold food) and a freezer truck (for frozen) goods are available at Fire Station No. 5, adjacent to the Noccalula Falls Campground on Noccalula Road.

A freezer truck and a refrigerated truck were set up Saturday at Gadsden's Fire Station No. 5 for residents affected by Thursday's storm to store food.
A freezer truck and a refrigerated truck were set up Saturday at Gadsden's Fire Station No. 5 for residents affected by Thursday's storm to store food.

Residents may bring food there until 8 p.m. on Saturday and from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Sunday, according to city officials, but food must be picked up by 8 p.m. Sunday or it will be thrown away. City officials said that is the limit of the generators powering the trucks, which they said were provided through the efforts of Rep. Robert Aderholt, R-Haleyville, and the Alabama Trucking Association.

Brett Johnson, chief of staff to Mayor Craig Ford — who declared a local emergency after the storm — said Aderholt’s field representative, James Manasco, was in Gadsden on Friday to discuss needs.

John Moore, the city’s director of economic development and governmental affairs, brought up the idea of a refrigerated truck, according to Johnson. Manasco said he could help and put Mark Colson, president of the trucking association, in touch with Moore, and within an hour the trucks from B&G Supply in Albertville were on hand.

The area on Lookout Mountain around the falls was hardest hit by the storm, which struck shortly after 2 p.m. on Thursday and packed 80 mph to 90 mph straight-line winds, according to the National Weather Service.

The winds were centered on Tabor Road, according to the NWS, and there were multiple reports there and on side streets like Argyle Place, Agricola Drive, Church Street and Elsmore Boulevard of homes damaged by downed trees. Twenty people sustained minor injuries in the storm.

As of 2:30 p.m. Saturday, Alabama Power’s online outage map reported 128 customers in Etowah County without power, all but six inside the Gadsden city limits. More than 10,800 customers in the county and more than 5,700 in the city were without power immediately after the storm.

Residents affected by the storms that hit the Lookout Mountain area of Gadsden on Thursday take advantage Saturday of the services offered at the disaster resource center set up by the City of Gadsden at Mitchell Community Center.
Residents affected by the storms that hit the Lookout Mountain area of Gadsden on Thursday take advantage Saturday of the services offered at the disaster resource center set up by the City of Gadsden at Mitchell Community Center.

Multiple utility trucks were still circulating in the area on Saturday, restoring power to homes that weren’t damaged enough to make that impossible.

Tabor Road was fully open on Saturday, according to city officials, but they asked people shopping at the World’s Longest Yard Sale to stay on it and not venture onto any of the side streets where crews were most active.

About 275 people had used the disaster resource center that opened Friday at the Mitchell Community Center, according to Ruth Moffatt, Gadsden’s director of diversity, equity and inclusion, who was heading up efforts there Saturday.

That center and another that opened at the Megan Kelley Dream Center on Black Creek Road allowed people to cool off, recharge their phones, pick up food and make contact with nonprofits with resources to help them in recovery from the storm.

Moffatt said the American Red Cross, Church of the Highlands, the Catholic Center of Concern, East Alabama Regional Planning and Development, Family Success Center, the Gadsden Public Library, It’s Your Move, Southern Baptist Disaster Relief and Voluntary Organizations Active in Disaster had been onsite at Mitchell.

This article originally appeared on The Gadsden Times: Cleanup continues from Gadsden storms