Sand dunes in southwest Georgia date back to Ice Age

By David Dixon

ALBANY — Sand dunes in Albany?

To an outsider who has never visited, that would seem far-fetched. Yet those of us who have been around this area for some time are well aware of this unique geological formation.

When visitors come to Albany, one of their stops may have been to view the large sand dunes. Some of the largest are easily viewed from a vehicle by traveling along the aptly named Sands Drive off Oglethorpe Boulevard. Albany is unique in this respect, as it is the only Georgia metropolitan area that has a “desert”.

However, Albany is not alone among Georgia cities that have sand dunes. The most recognizable formation is at Ohoopee Dunes Wildlife Management Area in Emanuel County. Along the northeastern banks of many of Georgia’s rivers, below the fall line, are various dune structures, some as long as 50 miles and as high as 100 feet. These dunes are usually arched or parabolic in form.

The dunes are called Eolian or Aeolian – meaning carried by the wind. That name comes from the Greek God of winds, Aeolus. While these dunes may be common in deserts around the world, their occurrence in south Georgia used to be a mystery, as this area was never known in prehistoric times to be a desert.

Thomas Thurman has written an excellent scientific, yet easily understandable, paper on these dunes. He writes, “As early as 1911, they were recognized as Pleistocene, or ice age, structures. Veatch and Stephenson reviewed several of them and concluded that the sand had likely been deposited during ice melt-driven river floods and the dunes formed at least partly by wind action afterwards.”

The Georgia dunes were confirmed to be Eolian in the 1970s, when satellite images became available for geologic study.

Later in 2002, Andrew Ivester with the State University of West Georgia and David Leigh with the University of Georgia further investigated a number of these dune fields. They concluded that the sand dune deposits were indeed formed from repeated cycles of severe river flooding caused by glacial melt from retreating ice fields.

It was the repeated flooding, followed by torrential monsoonal rains, that moved the sand from the Appalachian Mountains to be deposited in extremely large quantities in Georgia rivers and streams.

As the flooding subsided, large volumes of sand were left on the banks and in the riverbeds of the formerly fast-flowing rivers. Over time, strong winds from the west scoured out the sand and left it on the eastern riverbanks and formed the dunes we now see in downtown Albany and other places. This sandy soil now supports plants usually seen only in coastal parts of the southern U.S., such as gopher apple, summer farewell, and thyme-leaf sandwort.

In and around Albany, the dunes are not protected. They are owned by various individuals, businesses and the state. After the Great Flood of 1994, Albany State University reclaimed some dune sites for campus rebuilding. Other dunes are being harvested by construction companies to be used as concrete ingredients. Still other dunes have been destroyed by recreational activities from off-road vehicles, dirt bikes, and all-terrain vehicles.

The sand dunes of Albany have an appeal to visitors, and even film companies that need a desert but don’t have the budget to move to the western United States or elsewhere for filming.

Former Convention and Visitors Bureau Director Rashelle Minix has scouted the dunes many times for companies looking to film there.

“In fact, a film titled ‘Written in Blood’ did use these dunes for some scenes in that movie,” said Minix, who went on to add that, prior to COVID, Marvel Studios considered the area three times and the Discovery Channel has also scouted the dunes for potential use in a film that was made in Arizona.

These projects and other opportunities bring money into the community, sometimes for months while filming is taking place. Minix also noted that the State Film Office refers scouts all the time to Albany as part of their portfolio promotion, if a desert is required for the project.

These dunes possess a real value to Albany as they attract visitors and future film projects. It would be a huge loss to see them further destroyed.