Trees snapped, earth shook as massive oak crashed into south Bibb couple’s house

Connie Currie was keeping an eye on the weather.

Her wind chime clanged.

Then, as she puts it, the thing “went crazy.”

Currie and her husband, Bill, have been living off Feagin Road in south Bibb County for more than 40 years. From their place beneath the sprawling oaks on McArrell Drive between Ga. 247 and the Ocmulgee River, they can see and hear the planes taking off and landing at Robins Air Force Base.

But on Monday afternoon it was the sky that roared.

As dark clouds and strong winds shoved through much of Georgia — with 21 possible tornado sites — some of the fiercest gusts lashed the trees that, for four decades, had shaded the Curries’ house. The massive oaks, half a dozen or so of them uprooted, were no match for the tempest.

It was just past 1:30 p.m. when the Curries ducked into a hallway near their bedroom.

Kabloom.

A tree.

“It slammed the bedroom door shut,” Connie Currie, 63, said, “so we couldn’t see what happened.”

The tree had smashed the edge of their bedroom, crushing a walk-in closet they’d added on not long ago.

Outside, more mayhem. The ground trembled as trees cracked and thudded.

Under a shed in the back yard, the cab of Bill Currie’s 2001 Ford pickup — still shiny with barely 50,000 miles on it — was smushed. As was a yellow, early 1970s-model International Harvester tractor.

Tuesday morning, men with chain saws and a crane were there clearing the yard and pulling the tree off the house.

More severe thunderstorms are expected to sweep across the region Wednesday and, in spots, dump up to 2 inches of rain.

The Curries were taking no chances.

They wanted a tarp on their gashed roof before more foul weather hit.

“I’ve got two pair of pants — the ones I had on yesterday and these,” Connie Currie said. “All my clothes, my shoes, everything was in that walk-in closet.”

This story was originally published April 4, 2017 at 4:26 PM with the headline "Trees snapped, earth shook as massive oak crashed into south Bibb couple’s house."