MACON — For the second time in almost exactly a year, a mid-January snowstorm swept across Middle Georgia on Sunday as a wintertime jab of arctic air made itself felt — and seen.
For many, the wintry scene was a welcome one in stretches of the Peach State, where snow is often rare as traffic jams.
The brunt of the snowfall, 1 to 2 inches or a pinch more in a handful of spots, happened along the state’s Fall Line between Columbus and Macon and up toward I-20 just south of Athens.
“Most reports we’re getting are closer to an inch,” National Weather Service meteorologist Sam Marlow said.
Sunday’s storm didn’t pack the icy wallop of the one last January that dumped upward of 9 inches of snow as far south as Cordele and made travel treacherous for a couple of days.
On Sunday, skies were clearing by noon and roads remained passable, though officials advised caution to those venturing out.
In and around Macon, where temperatures hovered at or just above freezing, snow began falling about daybreak, and by midmorning when it stopped an inch or so had coated lawns and parks.
In downtown Macon, the Poplar Street business district was all but deserted at 8:30 a.m. save for a Weather Channel truck. A reporter with a cellphone recorded video of the flurries.
At Henry Burns Park in Macon’s Ingleside neighborhood, a few children played in the snow. An 11-year-old girl named Eeronii Thompson who lives nearby said she couldn’t miss the chance to swing in the snow.
Thompson said that when she looked out her window Sunday morning, she thought, “‘Oh, my God, it’s snowing for real.’ I didn’t think it was really gonna snow because that’s what my friends told me.”
In neighboring Jones County to the north, Sheriff Butch Reece said he knew of just one car wreck.
“It’s not bad,” Reece said, adding that the snow’s Sunday morning arrival time had canceled some church services. “So it’s keeping traffic off the roads.”
Atlanta was spared from the snow, with the accumulation occurring south and southeast of the city, a National Weather Service forecaster told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
There were some flurries from Newnan to McDonough and more accumulation south of LaGrange, the NWS forecaster said. But most of the snowfall occurred from the Columbus area to Macon, where about 1 to 2 inches were reported.
“It moved through quickly, and any impacts were short-lived,” the forecaster said.
Gusty northwesterly winds quickly pushed the clouds toward the coast, according to Channel 2 Action News meteorologist Brad Nitz on Sunday. By the afternoon, there was a high of 42 degrees and plenty of sunshine in Atlanta.
“The clouds have quickly begun to clear behind the front,” the NWS wrote just after 11 a.m.
As of 2 p.m. Sunday, Georgia Power said less than 600 customers in metro Atlanta were without power, down from 2,500 two hours earlier. Georgia EMCs reported just a handful of outages as of that same period.
While the clouds and moisture should stay away later Sunday, the frigid air won’t. Overnight temperatures should drop to 26 degrees in Atlanta, Nitz said.
On Monday, it’s projected to be sunny and chilly with lows in the mid-20s. Those low temperatures are expected to remain below freezing until Thursday, when they reach 40 degrees.
“Some clouds (are) back midweek as temperatures moderate a bit,” Nitz said. “Our next chance for rain comes next weekend.”
Credit: Channel 2 Action News
Credit: Channel 2 Action News
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