Thousands in Habersham County and more than a half million Georgians lost power for most of Thursday as Tropical Storm Zeta brought down trees and power lines all over the county.
The largest power outage in the county was in the Clarkesville area, as most of the city limits and nearby areas were down starting around 5 a.m. Habersham County closed its administrative offices, and schools were already closed after a decision on Wednesday night.
The Ruby Fulbright Aquatic Center also was closed early, postponing early voting until power returned around 2 p.m. Thursday.
Emergency Services Director Chad Black reminded anyone coming across a downed line to avoid it and treat any line as if it is energized.
As of Thursday afternoon, Habersham County received reports of 498 downed trees. Of those reported, 249 trees were on roadways. The other 249 trees were reported to be embedded within power lines.
Despite crews working to open roads and clear debris, Black said that trees have been falling throughout the day due to the amount of rain the area has received over the past few weeks, especially during Hurricane Delta.
“A lot of roads have opened up, but a big problem has been that the ground is saturated, so we still have trees going down in some places,” Black said. “We also have some trees down in power lines that the power company hasn’t gotten to and we can’t touch them because we’re not sure if the power is off to the lines.”
“We were hit hard again, but not as much on flooding this time.”
The traffic lights on Highway 365 south of Clarkesville all were out as commuters began to venture out of their homes, causing several wrecks. There also were two home rescues of families trapped on the second floor of their homes after trees fell on them.
“Due to coordination with local power companies, crews have been able to remove a significant number of trees in a timely manner,” County Manager Phil Sutton said.
There were still around 50 trees remaining embedded with power lines and 30 roads that remain closed as the work day ended Thursday.
Sutton said the area most negatively impacted by the storm is located north of Clarkesville and to the south end of Habersham County. Shoal Creek Road has experienced some damage sustained from washing.
“We’ve had about eight or 10 folks out this morning cutting trees that fell and cleaning roads to open them,” Habersham County Sheriff Joey Terrell said Thursday afternoon. “There are still a few areas without power, but most of our main roads are passable, but Habersham Mills, Level Grove, Duncan Bridge and roads like that still have parts of them closed. It’ll probably be a little while before we get everything back up and going.”
For power companies one of the major delays is that poles have broken and fixing them takes multiple hours.
“[Power crews] are working hard to get things back up, but a lot of their problem is that poles are broken,” Terrell said. “It usually takes about four hours to get one of those back up, but they’re getting to them as fast as they can.”
“The power companies are working as quickly as they can,” Black said. “We just don’t know when they’ll all be fixed. Some of it may not be done [Thursday], but we do have our voting precinct back up with power, and [the crews] working as hard as they can.”
Habersham County Schools and Tallulah Falls School announced closings for Friday. Habersham County announced Thursday night that business hours and voting hours will resume Friday, the last day of early voting.