LAURENS COUNTY, Ga. — Georgia Power is still working to ease widespread outage concerns following the damage many counties, including Laurens County, suffered during Hurricane Helene.
Laurens County EMA director Bill Laird said the county has six power companies assisting with restoration needs, adding their housing crews from Georgia Power along with Alabama Power and Mississippi Power.
Laird said that, while 60% of roadways are clear, some streets with broken traffic lights are being treated as stop-signs. Also, the county is making an effort to clear the streets of debris. City of Dublin Natural Gas is going around the city and disassembling uprooted trees.
"A lot of clean up. A lot of power lines down, probably one of the worst storms Middle Georgia has ever seen," Dublin Natural Gas' crew leader, Bryant McLendon, said.
He said that his team wants to help until all damage is clear and added it's been a collective effort from multiple departments and agencies.
"Everybody's communicating and tackling things that we can," McLendon said. "Just trying to get the streets clean, and a lot of people can't even get out of their house down the street because there's still trees down," McLendon said.
County Coroner Nathan Stanley confirmed two deaths in the county on Friday, both caused by falling trees. McLendon said tree damage hits close to home for some of his co-workers.
"Some of our actual co-workers here down the street had trees falling on their house into his grandson's living room," He said. "It's a lot of tragedy around here."
Laird said drivers from neighboring counties without access to gas are relying on Dublin stations. He's aware of the mile-long lines at the pump, but said that, as the power grid becomes more reliable, more essentials will, in-turn, become accessible. While Laird acknowledged how frustrating the situation is, but asked for people to proceed with patience.
"People just need to be patient, because we've got our local people and we have a few places to get gasoline," Laird said. "There's companies that are open, and the ones that have power actually being able to keep up with the demand."
Laird said they'll begin assessing damage Sunday, so he was not able to confirm the number of affected homes. However, he said there are no other reported storm related injuries.
He also said they've opened some of their debris staging sites, which were used for previous hurricanes. They're going to add more sites to collection centers around the county, so he said that residents can take their debris and drop it there.
Dublin Mayor Joshua Kight, in a statement, said power is slowly but steadily being restored. He added that he wants residents to use water conservatively.
"Today we turned off water service to laundromats, car washes and our large industrial users," the statement said. "Please continue to conserve water — essential use only."