Deadly Debby heads for South Georgia; National Guard troops ready

ATLANTA — Debby made landfall Monday morning as a Category 1 hurricane in Florida’s Big Bend region. It has now been downgraded to a tropical storm but has already claimed at least four lives, and its impact will be felt for several more days, including in Georgia.

The eye of the storm reached land in Steinhatchee, Florida, at 7 a.m. Eastern time, according to the National Hurricane Center. An hour later, Levy County Sheriff’s Office deputies got a call about a tree that had fallen onto a mobile home, crushing a 13-year-old boy in the small Gulf Coast town of Fanning Springs.

Also in Florida, a semi-truck driver was killed when his vehicle went into a canal in the Tampa area. Three hours north, in Dixie County, a driver lost control due to the weather, killing a 28-year-old woman and a 12-year-old boy. A 13-year-old boy was also seriously injured.

Here in metro Atlanta, we’ll stay mostly dry Monday. This afternoon, we can expect a few scattered showers and storms. Temperatures won’t be as high as they’ve been for the past week, either. Today’s high will top out in the upper 80s.

It’s a very different story further south. The storm’s track is pushing it over South Georgia and toward the East Coast, where between 10 to 20 inches of rain are anticipated. That is in addition to several inches of rainfall that some areas have already seen in July.

“We have one farm in my area that had 21 inches of rain in July alone,” said state Sen. Russ Goodman, a South Georgia farmer. “Whoever has been praying for rain can stop now.”

Gov. Brian Kemp has issued a state of emergency that will be in effect through Thursday due to the threat of historic rainfall with the slow-moving storm. On Monday, Kemp signed an emergency order authorizing the call-up of as many as 2,000 Georgia National Guard troops.

“The big story with this is this thing is going to slam on the brakes,” Channel 2 Action News meteorologist Brian Monahan said. “It’s not going to move, and that is not good with tropical systems.”

Locally, the main impact will be the wind, Monahan said. Over the next couple of days, we can expect gusts up to 30 mph.

On Sunday night, the storm registered 75 mph, upgrading it from a tropical storm to a hurricane at that point, according to the National Weather Service.

Dangerous storm surge conditions are expected along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts through the middle of the week, the NWS warns. Flash flooding is also expected along those coastlines.

The flooding, along with strong winds, will bring down trees and powerlines, causing the potential for extended outages.

“Get out,” Georgia Emergency Management and Homeland Security Agency Director Chris Stallings said during a news conference Sunday evening.

“Get you and your family out ahead of time ... Just because the system isn’t a hurricane doesn’t mean that it’s not going to be impactful. Some of our most impactful floods have been tropical storms and tropical depressions here in Georgia,” he added.

Motorists should avoid driving into water that appears shallow. The water can be much deeper than expected, and currents could be swift enough to sweep vehicles from the road.

“This is a life-threatening situation,” the Hurricane Center warned. “Persons located within these areas should take all necessary actions to protect life and property from rising water and the potential for other dangerous conditions.”

As a result of the storm, Vice President Kamala Harris postponed her rally Friday in Savannah. She was set to headline with her yet-to-be-named running mate, part of a four-day swing through several battleground states.

It is the second time in less than a year that Valdosta and surrounding areas were expecting hurricane or tropical storm conditions. Hurricane Idalia brought damaging winds and flooding to the area last year.

As the core of Debby chugged toward Valdosta, there were moderate gusts of wind and rain. Locals like Jared O’Neal, whose power is out and whose home suffered $50,000 in damage last year during Idalia, were buying generators. The Lowe’s store on St. Augustine Road sold around 30 of them Monday morning.

“There is still a possibility to see some flooding rains with a total of 10 to 15 inches, which is what was forecasted,” Meghan Barwick, spokesperson for the Lowndes County Emergency Management Agency, said Monday afternoon. “We’re still heavy winds and some gusts. We’ve got power lines down, trees down. Nothing like Hurricane Idalia, but we still want our folks to be vigilant and stay off the roads and at home if they can. We haven’t gotten reports of extensive damage with trees through houses like we did with Idalia.”

The Lowndes EMA estimated that about 25,000 people were without power early Monday afternoon.

In St. Simons, pounding rain and strong winds kept tourists and fisherman away from the main pier and nearby shops and restaurants Monday. Beaches were also deserted as residents and visitors still on the island prepared to hunker down.

The F.J. Torras Causeway, which connects Brunswick to St. Simons Island, remains open. According to a joint emergency declaration from Glynn County and Brunswick City commissioners, the causeway will remain open unless there are water hazards and flooding. The Sidney Lanier Bridge will remain open unless wind speeds reach 40 mph sustained. Any decision to close the bridge will be made by the Georgia Department of Transportation.

Airlines have canceled hundreds of flights, including on routes to and from cities in Florida.

Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines has issued a travel waiver for Fort Myers, Gainesville, Jacksonville, Key West, Sarasota, Tallahassee and Tampa, as well as Valdosta. It is allowing people who had flights booked to, from or through those cities over the weekend through Monday to reschedule their flights to avoid the impact of the storm without paying a higher fare, subject to certain conditions.

Joe Marinelli, president and CEO of Visit Savannah, the local convention and visitors bureau, said one saving grace of the storm impact is that it will hit the area during the early part of the week — a slower period for tourism, with no citywide conventions in town. Marinelli said he didn’t want to discourage people from visiting later in the week or next weekend.

”It will have some impact on those that were maybe planning to come into Savannah a couple days early (before the weekend) … but you know, this too shall pass,” he said.

Marinelli said he suspects some restaurants, tour operators and museums may close Tuesday and Wednesday, but he was not aware of any hotels in Savannah relocating guests.

Marinelli said on Monday morning: “It’s raining right now, but nothing more than a normal rain. … The concern is that it’s going to rain nonstop for three days.”

— Staff writers Kelly Yamanouchi and Ligaya Figueras contributed to this article.