Picking up the pieces after sudden storm

A downdraft can create a column of sinking air known as a microburst, and that weather condition is suspected of having accompanied yesterday afternoon’s storm that rocked OconeeCounty.  Shane Gibbs of Oconee Emergency Services believes the microburst struck the Tabor Road area near 123/the Westminster-Toccoa Highway.  Starting around 1:30, public safety responders dealt with downed trees, downed power lines and the like.  At one point, 535 Blue Ridge Electric Cooperative customers lost service in Oconee and Anderson counties.  Blue Ridge’s Terry Ballenger counted 11 outages in all.  The culprit was a broken power pole.  Extremely high winds hit Oconee’s neighbor to the west—StephensCounty, Georgia.  There, several trees fell including an oak tree that went through the living and bedroom areas of a mobile home near LakeHartwell.  Stephens County Sheriff Randy Shirley said a husband and wife were seated, attempting to ride out the storm.  They heard an extreme loud noise. The large oak came crashed through their roof missing them by inches, according to the home owner. Trees fell onto the roofs of two other mobile homes, but did not penetrate.