Quick Moving Storm Does Damage In White And Habersham Counties

3/18/18

Storm damage at The Top of Georgia AirStream Park Photo by: Rob Moore

(Helen)-Portions of White and Habersham Counties received damage from a storm system that moved through the area late Saturday night. The National Weather Service issued a severe thunderstorm warning Saturday night at 9:45 PM following a report of a severe thunderstorm that was located over Nottely Dam, northwest of Blairsville, moving southeast at 40 mph.

Susan Baker, spokeswoman for Habersham Electric Membership Corp. said Sunday afternoon, we started receiving outage reports from northern White County in the Skylake community, Tray Mountain vicinity and Hwy. 75 near The Top Of Georgia Airstream Park. Baker said due to the number of trees down in the roads, HEMC crews were unable to gain access to many of the outages until state and county road crews were able to clear the roads Sunday morning. HEMC linemen, along with the Forestry Service personnel, worked in the area.

According to Baker in addition to trees falling on power lines, there were also five broken poles, which takes approximately 6 to 8 hours each to repair. Power was expected to be restored in that area by 6 p.m. Sunday, for a total of 68 members.

After the storm hit White County, it moved into northern Habersham County, uprooting trees and causing additional outages, said Baker. There were four broken poles reported in the Orchard community and Bear Gap area by 10 p.m. Power was restored to those affected members by 12:30 p.m. on Sunday.

Katie Strickland, Department of Transportation District One spokesperson advised that maintenance crews responded to the storm damaged area with several pieces of equipment to clean up debris. They worked until 2AM Sunday morning.

White County Public Safety Director David Murphy said, Georgia Emergency Management Agency and National Weather Service officials will be visiting the area Monday to evaluate the damage. Murphy said, no injuries or fatalities were reported.