Readers' storm photos, Part I (updated Tues. 11:04 a.m.)Sunday's storm photosA man was killed, a handful of people were injured and dozens of homes and businesses were damaged this morning as strong storms – including at least one confirmed tornado – swept across Middle Georgia before dawn.
The Laurens County coroner released the identity of the man killed this morning during a severe weather outbreak that may have spawned a tornado.
Tracey Clements, who is believed to be in his 40s, was killed inside the family's double-wide mobile home at 2731 U.S. 441 North near Evergreen Road in Laurens County, said Richard Stanley, Laurens County coroner.
Clements, his wife Lisa Clements and two grandchildren were inside the mobile home when a suspected tornado hit.
"It looked like it kind of picked it up off the foundation and flipped it over," Stanley said.
Lisa Clements was taken to The Medical Center of Central Georgia for treatment of serious injuries, but the children were not seriously hurt, Stanley said. Two others were injured.
In Macon, the National Weather Service has confirmed what a lot of south Maconites already knew all too well: A bona fide tornado hit the city this morning just before 6 a.m.
A curfew will be in effect in Macon and Bibb County from 8 tonight until 6 a.m. Monday morning, Mayor Robert Reichert announced this afternoon.
Also, a shelter will be open at Freedom Park for those whose homes have been damaged in the storm. Freedom Park is located on Roff Avenue near Payne City.
Reichert put the curfew in place by executive order, and he said police will enforce it.
"Be careful out there tonight," he said. "Go home, stay home."
Bibb County schools will be closed Monday as officials continue to assess damage to the buildings.
Of the schools, Westside High was the hardest hit, although Southwest High and Rice Elementary also sustained damage, Bibb Superintendent Sharon Patterson said thi afternoon.
Patterson advised teachers, staff and students to stay at home. However, the central office will remain open, and principals will meet there Monday morning to make the necessary plans. The school board will decide in the afternoon whether to open schools on Tuesday, Patterson said.
Also, Macon State College, Central Georgia Technical College, Tattnall Square, Academy, Twiggs Academy and Mount de Sales Academy, First Presbyterian Day School and Stratford Academy will be closed Monday. Johnson County schools will be closed until at least Wednesday.
Emergency officials and other relevant city and county officials planned to huddle again at 7 a.m. Monday to continue assessing the damage and move forward. Public works and power crews worked through the night, and police patrols were beefed up to protect the worst-hit areas, where crumpled walls and roofs left homes and businesses vulnerable.
The most severe damage across the midstate likely was caused by two separate tornadoes, according to the National Weather Service in Peachtree City.
That has not been confirmed but "based on the radar data it certainly looks like, in all likelihood, we had a tornado," said Mike Griesinger, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Peachtree City.
The first moved from Lizella into the city of Macon, Griesinger said. The second hit north of Dublin in Laurens County. The weather service has a staff member en route to Macon now, Griesinger said.
Gov. Sonny Perdue declared a state of emergency in six Georgia counties this afternoon, a designation that makes state resources available to the area.
Three of the counties are in Middle Georgia: Bibb, Johnson and Laurens counties. The other three are Carroll County on the Alabama state line, Douglas County near west metro Atlanta and Jefferson County near Augusta.
Perdue already was planning to visit Macon on Monday for a Kumho Tire groundbreaking and Georgia Farm Bureau event. He may also survey the storm damage, his press secretary said today.
Macon under state of emergency
Mayor Robert Reichert declared a state of emergency in Macon and asked people to stay at home in the wake of widespread damage across the south side of the city.
There have been no reports of serious injuries or deaths in the city. People who reported that they couldn't get out of their house or driveway this morning due to downed trees or power lines have all been attended to and are no longer stuck, according to the Macon Police Department.
Reichert said he hasn't heard any reports of looting, but there are blown out store fronts in south Macon.
The destruction of several well known buildings points to the extent of the damage done across south Macon this morning.
The Olympia Family Fun Center on Mercer University Drive was leveled, according to Bibb County EMA Director Johnny Wingers. The roof was torn off the gym at Macon State College. The old Westgate shopping center was severely damaged.
South Macon hammered
Swaths of south Macon are a jungle of debris.
Trees and tree parts crashed down and pelted neighborhoods between Eisenhower Parkway and Rocky Creek Road when Sunday’s predawn storm slammed through.
Along many streets around Southwest High School and the south Pio Nono Avenue corridor, pine trees and hardwoods took the brunt of the storm’s fury before crash landing on houses, parked cars and roads.
After the sun came up, awestruck residents and the curious wandered in streets where dead power lines dangled, stunned by what they saw: houses smushed, green leaves everywhere.
The Mother's Day morning bore the surreal look and feel of one where an overnight snow had fallen, except it was a mid-spring blanket of green that littered lawns and left mouths agape.
“It’s a catastrophe," Robert Williams, who lives off Rocky Creek Road in Bloomfield, said. "A lot of folks ain’t got no money to cut trees and rebuild homes.”
Janice Dowling, who lives on St. Charles Place, not far from the Piggly Wiggly on Rocky Creek, figured her “house was about to cave in” when the storm tore over. The top third of a pine tree crushed one end of her roof.
Dowling said when the wind roared, in a panic, the first thing she could think to do was grab her cell phone. “I guess to call people and tell them goodbye,” she said.
Around her house, it seemed as though every third or fourth house had a tree or a limb leaning on it or smashed through it. The devastation in the already economically depressed area comes in a spot where many residents are renters. It would be hard to see how there won’t be dozens, if not hundreds, of residents displaced.
“You think people are gonna come back to this? You think they’re gonna wait for people to fix it,” said David Heath, who lives on Frances Drive, just west of Rice Mill Road and the Gold Cup bowling center. “It’s gonna end up being a ghost town.”
In the Houston Avenue area of south Macon, strong winds damaged dozens of trees, and residents such as Sheree Barkley of Toombs Street was out surveying the damage early in the morning. Strong winds "peeled them down like bananas," she said of the trees.
"It was pitch black in the dark. Lightning was flashing. It was like a 747 came through," said Billy Dumas, who lives on St. Charles Place.
Lake Tobesofkee area homes, Macon State, Westside High damaged
The west side of Macon was hit by the storm about 5:45 a.m. Power went out shortly before the possible tornado struck, shearing off trees and damaging rooftops.
Waters Edge, a subdivision on the west side of Lake Tobesofkee, was hit hard and many houses along Columbus Road were also badly damaged. Tops of trees were also torn off on the east side of the lake.
At the rear of Westside High School an attached trailer was laid on its side and a huge roof-mounted air conditionining unit dumped to the ground. In the Heath Place subdivision one house lost its roof but amazingly none of the contents inside moved.
Another house had its back porch destroyed and several outdoor sheds were blown over or blown away. There was also a major gas leak but Warner Robins crews had it shut down before 11 a.m.
Macon State College suffered roof damage to the gym and more than 100 trees were felled or sheared off.
Some motels along Eisenhower Parkway and I-475 suffered major damage and some of the parkway west of I-475 was closed as crews worked to remove trees. Olympia Skate Center suffered major damage as did several gas stations along Mercer University Drive.
Kite mayor: Town still standing; Johnson County under curfew
The city of Kite, population about 200, is still standing in eastern Johnson County.
"Everybody's got a tree down" and mobile homes outside of town were destroyed by this morning's storms, Fire Chief Donald Peebles said. But media reports that the entire town was destroyed are not true, including online reports with CNN and USA Today, Peebles said.
Mayor Kenneth Carroll was able to take calls at City Hall earlier today, though telephone service was spotty and water and power were out.
"It took out a big portion of the city gym," Carroll said. "There is probably 10 or 15 houses that have trees on top of them, at least 10 or 15."
Elsewhere in Johnson County, nine families were trapped in their homes and had to be freed by rescuers early Sunday, said Doug Eaves, county administrator.
Several homes and buildings were damaged and numerous trees and power lines are down across roads. While electricity is expected to be restored in the cities of Johnson County tonight, it could be Tuesday before service is fully restored in the rural areas of the county, Eaves said.
Johnson County is under a curfew from 9 p.m. until sunrise Monday. While most of the state and county roads are expected to be clear tonight, it could be Wednesday before all the roads are passable. Much of the area is without water as the top of the water tower blew off in the storm, compromising the water supply, Eaves said.
Wrightsville workers were shutting off the water at the tank this afternoon to keep it from shooting out of the top of the open tower when electricity is restored.
Firefighters from surrounding counties set up a command post at the Wrightsville Fire Department and Georgia Department of Transportation workers helped clear the roads, Eaves said. It is likely that Johnson County schools will close Monday, he said.
Storm causes power, water, cable, phone problems
There are about 58,000 people without power in the Macon area, according to Georgia Power. An extra 300 crew members are heading to Middle Georgia from the Atlanta area, but it will likely be midnight Monday before power is restored to all of the customers without it, a Georgia Power spokeswoman said this afternoon.
The company can't say which neighborhoods will come back online first, though the plan is to fix problems that affect hte largest number of people first, spokeswoman Theresa Robinson said.
"It is widespread," she said. "These broken power polls are everywhere."
Traffic signals were out across south Macon all morning, particularly along Eisenhower Parkway, Riverside Drive Houston Avenue, Log Cabin Road, in the Bloomfield area, along Rocky Creek Road and Pio Nono Avenue. Some of the traffic signals remained out late this afternoon.
Some Macon residents were without water this morning. By 4 p.m., water pressure should have been restored in all but a couple of areas of Bibb County, Macon Water Authority Executive Director Tony Rojas said.
The only areas still showing low pressure late this afternoon were Bloomfield and the area around the intersection of Forest Hill Drive and Forsyth Road, Rojas said. Those areas should be stabilized by this evening, he said.
The pressure dropped in most areas after the authority lost power at its main water plant. The generators came on, but the breakers had been tripped and wouldn't close. Eventually the situation was fixed and the pumps turned back on.
"We're definitely back on," Rojas said. "And our pressure that we're pumping into the system ... is normal."
Some 70,000 telephones are out in the Macon area, according to the mayor's office.
Nextel cellular users in the Macon area and throughout much of south Georgia are without service this evening.
A local exchange carrier lost power, which also brought the Nextel network down. The problem is being addressed, but there's no definite timetable for service to be re-established, Nextel spokeswoman Kristin Wallace said.
The network from Macon south to the Florida panhandle has been affected, Wallace said. That includes city of Macon cell phones, which means many city employees have been using their personal cell phones or land lines as they try to assess damage across the city.
Cox Communications estimates about 40,000 customers have lost cable service, spokeswoman Mary Huff said this afternoon.
Most of them are in Macon, but there are others scattered throughout Middle Georgia, she said. Cox is working with other utilities to assess the damage and make reparis. Wind may cause more outages, she said, and customers can call (478) 784-8000.
The county tax assessors office is going to be traveling across the county to assess the damage, according to Tax Assessor Jim Davis.
City officials are working out of Emergency Management headquarters at City Hall. No shelters have been opened for people whose homes have been damaged, but they may be once authorities assess the need, Reichert said.
The state of emergency designation will help the city get extra resources from the state, including the Georgia Department of Transportation, Reichert said. He implored people to stay home and let authorities work.
"If you don't have to be out, please stay home," he said.
Macon hospitals experiencing problems due to water
Low water pressure at The Medical Center of Central Georgia has led the hospital to call in fire department tankers to pump water into the air conditioning chillers, the hospital's EMS director.
The situation at the hospital had been improving, but consistent pressure is only available on the first floor and, at times, the second, said Lee Oliver, the hospital's EMS director. At the moment there are no plans to move anyone, Oliver said, but that might be reassessed later this afternoon.
Coliseum Hospital has water, according to a hospital representative at the city's emergency management headquarters. Coliseum Northside Hospital has some water problems, but they are not as serious as those at the medical center, the representative said.
Storms didn't drop much rain in Macon's official gauge
The storms that swept through the midstate Saturday and today brought just a third of an inch to Macon's official rain gauge, the National Weather Service said today.
Officially at Middle Georgia Regional Airport, the city saw a trace of rain Saturday and .34 inches today, NWS meteorologist Matt Sena said.
"I know areas of Macon got a lot more rain than that, but it missed the rain gauge," he said.
Sena said the northern two-thirds of Bibb County likely received between 1 and 2 inches of rain over the weekend, based on radar images.
Come back to macon.com for more on this developing story, including photos and video from the scene.
Joe Kovac Jr., Harold Goodridge, Charles Richardson, Jennifer Burk, Oby Brown and Grant Blankenship contributed to this report..
