Peach County community reflects on Hurricane Katrina tornado on 20-year anniversary

On August 29, 2025, Hurricane Katrina made landfall in Middle Georgia, with tornadoes ripping through Peach and Taylor Counties.

FORT VALLEY, Georgia (41NBC/WMGT) – On August 29, 2025, the Robins Financial Credit Union in Fort Valley stands tall, open, and ready for business. But that wasn’t the case 20 years ago.

It’s been two decades since Hurricane Katrina made landfall in New Orleans, where it caused severe damage and destruction to thousands of people and their livelihoods. That same day, the storm hit Middle Georgia, with a tornado ripping through Peach and Taylor Counties.

“I didn’t expect for it to do what it did in Fort Valley,” said Andrew Smith, a Peach County resident. 

Smith says he was inside a neighboring convenient store paying for gas when he heard a tornado siren go off and was soon pushed up against the store’s glass window. He says, he lifted his arms and looked both directions, not being able to see anything to his left due to heavy rain.

“I looked to my right at the credit union, and I didn’t see the credit union, it was gone,” Smith said. 

The tornado ripped the bank in half. Close to 40 homes in Peach County had either loss shingles, broken windows, or tree limbs on the roof. With 17 acres of land, Janza Hilson Coar says the cleanup process was extensive.

“It had lowered the top of the roof of the carport, fell over my Zero Turn, broke the front window, knocked down several trees, and further up in the backyard we had a hundred-year-old tree,” Coar said. “It tore it down also.”

Henry Wilson, Deputy Director of the Peach County Emergency Management Agency, played a major role in that cleanup. He says preparing for and responding to severe weather looks a lot different now thanks to new technology but says the community coming together the way in the way it did then is timeless.

“Law enforcement had a role, the EMA had a role, the fire department had a role,” Wilson said. “And I think everybody carried their roles out. I think we did a good job.” 

Despite the damage, there were no reported fatalities in Peach County, a feat that those who endured the storm don’t take for granted.

“I didn’t have nothing to stand on but my two feet and God,” Smith said. “And he saved me.”