Severe Weather Saturday: January 21, 2012

This past Saturday, January 21, 2012, was certainly an eventful day weather-wise.

All in all, there were two confirmed tornadoes in the Peach State — both of which occurred in Middle Georgia.

A cold front moved across the state on Saturday and it packed quite a punch!

There were wind and hail reports all across the state but in Middle Georgia trees were taken down in Sandersville (Washington County), Gray (Jones County), and Eastman (Dodge County).

The first confirmed tornado was an EF 1 in Macon County. After an assessment by the National Weather Service, it was determined that at 3:45 in the afternoon, an EF-0 tornado touched down and strengthened into an EF-1. Winds inside of this tornado were around 110 mph!

Damage from this tornado was reported along Mennonite School Road, north of Highway 26. A home and two large chicken houses were destroyed and another chicken house was damaged. The National Weather Service estimates that 25 trees were taken down or snapped, five homes had roof damage, and one porch was also destroyed. A barn roof was also lifted off.

Just half an hour later in Dooly County a second tornado touched down. This was an EF 0 that touched down at approximately 4:15 in the afternoon. Winds were estimated to be about 80 mph.

The EF 0 touched down along Old National Road near Pinehurst. Many trees were taken down or uprooted.

One power pole was also taken down.

Saturday’s events show us the importance of having a way to stay weather aware.

I can count the number of personal friends who have weather radios on one hand, and that’s not good. You don’t have to go out and buy the biggest and most expensive contraption either!

There are applications for smartphones that not only allow you access to radar, but they have weather radios too!

It’s time like these that we must remember severe weather doesn’t just happen in the spring months. It can happen anywhere, and it can happen at any time of the year, as we saw on Saturday.

The positive aspect we can take from Saturday’s storms is that they took place during the day. Too many times in the history of weather records, severe weather happens at night when people are sleeping and they don’t even know what’s coming.

The sun might be shining today, but there’s NO better time to invest in some way to stay weather aware.

On behalf of Chief Meteorologist Michael Estime, I want to thank those of you who turned to us on Saturday. We only cut in over programming when we feel that lives and property are at stake, and we thank YOU for trusting in us!