A woman killed Monday when a tree fell on a vehicle in a Forsyth County driveway was the wife of a former Cumming police chief, officials said.
Nancy and Mike Eason were checking on relatives during Tropical Storm Irma when a tree crashed on their car in a private driveway near Shadburn Road, Deputy Doug Rainwater with the Forsyth County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release Tuesday.
“This was during the height of some of the worst weather we were experiencing (Monday) afternoon,” Forsyth County fire Chief Jason Shivers told Channel 2 Action News. “The winds had picked up and were gusting very, very strongly.”
Nancy Eason, 57, was in the passenger seat at the time of the deadly accident. It was one of at least three deaths in Georgia blamed on Irma, a devastating system that left more than 1 million customers in the state without power.
Mike Eason was driving. He suffered only minor injuries, Rainwater said.
Mike Eason was named Cumming’s police chief in 2005 and served in that capacity until 2009. Prior to that, he worked for 31 years with the GBI.
During the 1996 Olympics, he served as state coordinator for thousands of visiting police from local, state and military departments.
Mike Eason also directed state police at the 1988 Democratic National Convention in Atlanta and consulted for the Australian police before the 2000 Games in Sydney.
Nancy Eason was a retired court reporter who worked for both the Forsyth and Cherokee judicial systems for many years, Rainwater said.
“The entire Forsyth County community is mourning the loss of this special lady,” Rainwater said.
In a statement, the Cumming Police Department described Nancy Eason as “a wonderful lady with a kind, giving heart and a friend to many. This is a huge loss to our community. Her family is in our thoughts and prayers.”
Read and sign the online guestbook for Nancy Eason
— Information from The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s archives was used in this article.
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