Dougherty EMA transitioning to storm recovery phase

ALBANY — The three storm-damaged sections of Dougherty County impacted by the weekend storms and Sunday’s tornado have been searched, cleared and everyone living in those sections accounted for, Dougherty County Emergency Management Agency Director Ron Rowe said during a storm debriefing Thursday afternoon.

The EMA manager said the search and rescue portion of recovery efforts is winding down with the previously reported four confirmed deaths, six elderly or health-impaired individuals discovered in “Sector C” who had been confined to their homes without power or a means to call for help, and the one missing 2-year-old child. Rowe said around 200 rescue workers had spent the entire day searching for Detrez Green, who was reported missing by his mother, Adijah Rainey, after the tornado destroyed the family’s home.

“Once the trailer (that the family lived in) was cleared, the search expanded outward in a semicircular radius toward a nearby pond,” Rowe said before showing a video of workers lowering the level of the pond to 8 feet to clear access for a dive team as it prepared to enter. “This process is extremely labor-intensive. That’s a heavily wooded area, and the rescue workers took it down to the dirt.”

Rowe said that, in light of the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s declaration Wednesday that the Jan. 2 storm (which he called “Storm 1”) had been declared a federal emergency and the same announcement Thursday concerning the Jan. 22 event (“Storm 2”), FEMA personnel had arrived in the community to begin individual assessments in the most heavily damaged areas.

“FEMA’s folks are on the ground, going door-to-door to preregister residents for individual and public assistance,” Rowe said during the 2 p.m. news conference. He later confirmed that businesses, both large and small, impacted by the storm would be eligible to seek assistance as well.

Rowe said a completed assessment of Sector B — the only one of the three that has undergone complete assessment — shows 307 residences and four businesses destroyed by the storm, 220 residences and two businesses that sustained major damage, and 46 residences that have minor damage.

In Sector A, the assessment has so far yielded 21 residences with major damage and five with minor damage.

“We are in the process of transitioning from search and rescue to recovery phase,” Rowe said. “We will continue our search for the missing child, help DFACS and Public Health screen shelters to determine longer-term needs, work with FEMA to manage incoming federal support, and begin the transition from mitigation to recovery phase.”

Information provided during the news conference shows that Georgia Search and Rescue, the Georgia Forestry Department, local law enforcement agencies, the Georgia Department of Natural Resources, and the Lowndes County Search and Rescue Dive Team are assisting Dougherty EMA in the recovery efforts.