A series of rain events – highlighted by an all day deluge Saturday – brought rains measuring from four and a half to five inches to Lamar County last week, putting the final nails in the coffin of a five-year drought. The rains were welcome but caused some problems – mostly for county road maintenance personnel. ’We had four, two-man crews out all day Saturday checking drainage problems. We had fourteen roads where there were flooding problems. These were instances where the pipes couldn’t handle the volume of water or where there were no pipes along dirt roads. I was concerned we would have problems with falling trees in the wind Sunday but we didn’t,’ county administrator Wayne Patterson said. The most serious issue was on Old Highway 41 near Dora Cox Realty where a pipe became partially blocked. ‘We are going to have to dig that one out,’ Patterson added. Other roads where problems were reported included Cook, Pleasant, Steele, Edie Creek, Rock Springs, Sudduth, McCollum, Fredonia Church, Ramah Church, Williams, Liberty Hill, Crawford and Five Points. Mike Maynard of the Georgia State Patrol post in Forsyth noted troopers were busy with accidents during the deluge but the most serious injury was to a four-year-old child involved in a crash on Ridgeway Road Saturday. The child suffered facial injuries from air bag deployment. ’We had another incident on I-75 where a vehicle hit a tractor-trailer. The truck overturned and spilled produce all over the road. It was a big mess but there were no serious injuries,’ Maynard said. Barnesville police chief Chuck Keadle said his officers reported no problems. ‘We got a good rain and we needed it,’ Keadle said. City manager Kenny Roberts concurred. ‘We were out and about keeping an eye on things. We had some drainage issues in some areas where we knew drainage was poor but that was it. We had no utility problems at all,’ Roberts said. The city reservoir was not an issue, either. But the runoff from the deluge just ran over the spillway there. ‘The reservoir was full before the latest rain,’ Roberts said. Southern Rivers Energy also suffered few problems. ’We squeaked by without much trouble. We only had about 130 outages total, most of which were lightning related in the High Falls area and some in Bibb County,’ cooperative spokesperson Erin Cook reported.
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