North Georgia is bracing for a heavy onslaught of rain over the next few days and through the weekend – the swan song of Tropical Depression Cindy.
The metro Atlanta area – specifically neighborhoods north of Interstate 20 – could see about half an inch of rain over the weekend through scattered showers, forecasters said.
The storm system, which originated in the Gulf of Mexico, made landfall early Thursday and is affecting coastal communities in Louisiana and Texas.
Cindy is expected to make its way through Mississippi and Alabama, and eventually to the Tennessee Valley, meteorologists forecast. It has already been blamed for the death of a 10-year-old boy in Alabama.
“Over the next few days,” Channel 2 Action News meteorologist Karen Minton said, “the remnants of Cindy will bring heavy rain to North Georgia.”
It could mean as much as 3 inches of rain for the area, upping the risk for flash floods and putting local emergency officials on high alert.
“It’s normal to have storms in the summer. It is not necessarily normal to have as much rain as we’ve had this month,” National Weather Service meteorologist Keith Stellman said. “It certainly doesn’t feel like June, or summer for that matter.”
In northern Gilmer County, which contains mountains as well as flat rural farmland, emergency responders are breaking out their water rescue gear, in preparation for possible flooding Friday and this weekend.
“It only takes couple of inches [of rain] over a short period of time that can send some of the waterways here into a severe flooding situation and cause damage to property,” Gilmer Fire Chief Tony Pritchett said.
This can cause residents to become trapped in their houses or cars, according to Pritchett.
Early afternoon Thursday, conditions in the region were not severe. However, Pritchett said, his department is trying to be “proactive instead of reactive.”
“We’re as prepared as can be for whatever situation may come our way,” he said.
Andy Futch, the owner and operator of R&A Orchards in Elijay, said he’s gotten used to all the rain, and isn’t too worried about this weekend.
“They’re not saying we’re going to get a lot of wind out of it,” he said. “I don’t foresee any problems with what’s going on. If you remember last year this time, everybody was wanting rain.”
Futch allowed that the rain could make it tougher to farm apples, peaches and vegetables at the orchard.
“When it’s raining, it’s hard to pick peaches when you’re getting wet every five minutes,” he said.
Georgians have endured an abnormally high amount of rainfall over the past week, which Minton said was of a tropical nature, but not linked to Tropical Depression Cindy. It resulted in consistently gray skies, slow commutes and downed trees.
Roads stayed wet in counties north of I-20 during much of the day Thursday, as Cindy was downgraded from a tropical story to a tropical depression. Heavy storms struck the northwest Atlanta suburbs Thursday afternoon, and a tornado warning was issued for several counties near Canton for about an hour.
Stellman, who works in the weather service’s Atlanta office, said rainfall is expected to worsen in North Georgia as the weekend creeps closer. A total of 1 to 3 inches of rain are expected in that region through the weekend, he said.
Late Sunday and into Monday, at least an additional half an inch of rain is expected in much of the state.
“We finally get a break and begin to dry out by Tuesday,” Stellman said.
Pritchett warned residents to not drive through large puddles on the road and make emergency preparations if they live near a waterway.
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