Hurricane Gustav evacuees begin arriving in Ga. (updated)

NOAA infrared satellite image of Hurricane Gustav over the central Gulf of Mexico.

Georgia officials are readying plans to accept several thousand evacuees, if necessary from states that may be hit by Hurricane Gustav in the next several days.

Georgia Emergency Management Agency spokesman Buzz Weiss says two emergency shelters were opened Sunday afternoon:

"We opened, in collaboration with the Red Cross, two shelters: one in Villa Rica, the other in La Grange. As of last night, we had about 67 people in the Villa Rica facility, with a capacity of about 250; we had about 60 people in the La Grange shelter, with a capacity of about 500."

Weiss says say traffic on interstate highways I-20 and I-85 into Georgia from Alabama has risen significantly as of Sunday afternoon.

The Georgia Highway Patrol says over half of the license tags were from Louisiana and Mississippi.

Weiss says GEMA is closely monitoring the situation:

“…and as the need develops, we will look at the need to open additional shelters along the I-20 and I-85 corridor”

The hurricane is expected to make landfall Monday morning.

Metro Atlanta hotels and motels say they're renting rooms to self-evacuees from Alabama, Louisiana and Mississippi.

NASA visual satellite image of Hurricane Gustav over the central Gulf of Mexico.

Click here for updated NWS radar and satellite maps of the New Orleans area.

Click here for more GPB News coverage of recent hurricane activity in Gulf of Mexico.

Tornado damage in northeast Georgia

Apparent tornadoes caused damage in Hall and Jackson counties Tuesday afternoon. Officials in Hall say two elementary schools sustained roof damage, but no injuries were reported. In nearby Jackson County, high winds damaged about 40 mobile homes in the city of Commerce--two people were injured there.

Storms upset Atlanta airport schedule

Storms in north Georgia Sunday interrupted power and water service, as well as producing airline delays at Atlanta’s airport. Officials with Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport say delays were up to two hours late in the afternoon yesterday. Hundreds of travelers were reportedly still stranded late Sunday due to canceled flights.

Record year for storm damage

State Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine says severe weather in 2008 has set a record for damage losses. He estimates Georgians have experienced more than $400 million in insured losses since January. That surpasses the previous record set in 1998. Oxendine expects the figures to climb as more losses are tallied from Tuesday night’s storms.

Sumter Regional close to full service

Sumter Regional Hospital in Americus will be back open for full-service business starting tomorrow. Since a tornado ripped through the town March 1st, 2007, the facility has been able to provide only urgent care out of tents and modular buildings. Now the hospital will be able to offer the full menu of services--surgical to inpatient--in its 76-bed facility. A permanent replacement hospital will be opened in 2010 after ground is broken in October. Last March, the storms that swept through Georgia killed nine people in Sumter, Taylor, and Baker counties--accounting for more than 210-million dollars in damage.

Congressman wants additional storm-damaged counties included in assistance request

A Georgia congressman wants Governor Sonny Perdue to request expedited federal assistance for counties in eastern Georgia damaged by this weekend's storms.

Only Atlanta and Fulton County made it to Perdue's request for expedited federal assistance.

But the storms wreaked havoc statewide.

And U.S. Rep. Paul Broun (R-Athens) says Perdue should include 10 counties in the 10th congressional district in that request.

But officials with the Georgia Emergency Management Agency say they typically place the hardest hit area in the state on such a list.

They say it makes getting a disaster declaration for both Atlanta/Fulton County and other counties ravaged by the storm faster and easier, rather than assessing multiple counties at once.

"Those that are eligible can be added on in less complicated fashion than getting the initial one," says Ken Davis, a spokesman for the Georgia Emergency Management Agency. "Getting the initial declaration is the key."

State officials are still awaiting word on the status of the request.

Officials say they do not yet have a dollar amount on how much damage the storms caused statewide.

Strong storms moving into Georgia

There is severe weather moving into Georgia this morning--counties in extreme west Georgia are under a tornado watch until 10am this morning. Strong storms are expected to move from the northwest to the southeast, bringing 1-2 inches of rain. Forecasters warn the weather could be similar to that of last week, which caused 15-million dollars of damage to over a thousand homes--Carroll County was especially hard hit. Storms should reach Macon and Athens by mid-afternoon today, and then to the coast by sunset before moving out.

Storms, high winds sweep across west Georgia

Click map for full-size image. Courtesy National Weather Service

Multiple counties in western and northwestern Georgia were under tornado warnings and watches through most of Sunday afternoon and evening.

There were unconfirmed reports that tornados had touched down in areas northwest of Atlanta, as well as further south near Columbus and Macon.

Residents in the metro Atlanta area reported heavy rain, flooded streets and underpasses and, in some cases, large hailstones.

Georgia Power reports some 5,000 households without power in central Georgia, after high winds knocked down power lines.

A tornado warning remains in effect until 01:00 Monday morning, across a wide swath of central Georgia, according to the National Weather Service. Click here for real-time updates and further details.

Severe weather moving through Georgia

Radar image of affected area. Click on the image for an interactive map. (National Weather Service)

Severe storms that spawned tornadoes in Tennesee, Arkansas, and Kentucky overnight are now moving into Georgia this morning.

The National Weather Service has issued a tornado watch for a 42-county area of the state until 2pm this afternoon. The watch-area is for people in areas of the state extending from northwest Georgia, south through the metro Atlanta area, into central and west-central Georgia.

The storms that moved through areas of the South overnight are reported to have killed 44 people.

Clikc here for updated NWS information.

GPB: LATE WINTER STORMS DISRUPT AIR TRAVEL IN NORTHEAST

by Valarie Edwards

A late winter storm in the northeast, means hundreds of cancelled flights from Washington, D.C., to Boston.

Atlanta’s Delta Airlines was forced to cancel 250 of its flights, including those in and out some of the nation’s busiest airports.

Hardest hits are the New York area’s three major airports, including Kennedy, LaGuardia and Newark International in New Jersey.

Delta Airlines spent Thursday contacting thousands of its customers, says Delta spokesperson Gina Laughlin.

“By proactively cancelling flights, that helps us do two things. One, we can start contacting customers early but it also ensures that we don't have airplanes stuck in airports where inclement whether is imminent.”

Other airlines reporting cancellations include American, Northwest and Jet Blue.

Jet Blue came under fire in early February after an ice storm stranded thousands of passengers for hours on planes parked on New York area runways.

The National Weather Service expects rain and snow to continue in the north east throughout much of the weekend.