Irma Churning in the Atlantic: Affecting North Georgia, Union County, Blairsville

Blairsville, GA – Hurricane Irma, touted as the strongest hurricane ever recorded in the Atlantic Ocean, is churning away causing untold damage as it skirts the north side of the Greater Antilles heading for the southern tip of Florida. All indications are, at this time, that Irma will directly impact South Florida. This is giving rise to a mass exodus of Floridians to the north.

Some of those Floridians are headed to North Georgia; and Blairsville, Union County is one of the destinations. FetchYourNews.com Union County reporter Mark Smith spoke with several Blairsville/Union County officials, the Union County Chamber of Commerce (UCCC), Murphy USA (Wal-Mart gas station), and a few local businesses.

UCCC Director of Tourism Tobie Chandler said she has asked local short-stay accommodation providers for updates, but, she said, it’s too soon for a response. Chandler did say that the UCCC has experienced an approximate 20 per cent increase in phone inquiries for local pet-friendly accommodations. The Comfort Inn and the Best Western Milton Inn, both in Blairsville, indicated a moderate increase in reservations. The facility manager at Cabins at Highlands Falls said their pet-friendly accommodations are booked solid through September 12th.

Lauren Walker, manager of Trackrock Stables, said she is slashing their overnight stall rental fees by fifty per cent from $20 to $10/night and that Florida is waving health certificates; which means that they will have to carefully inspect all animals coming in.

Kaye McCann, Blairsville City Clerk, said her office has not experienced any impact so far.

Captain Doug Lloyd of the UCSO said that, oddly, the only thing he is aware of regarding the impact of Irma in Union County is that Florida residents/home owners here in Blairsville have cleared the Blairsville Home Depot out of all water, gas cans and electric generators; presumably to take back to Florida. Smith called both Home Depot and Ace Hardware of Blairsville and they confirmed that people from Florida are buying up all of the water, gas cans and generators. Home Depot was sold out of all three items and Ace was out of gas cans and had only two generators left in stock at the time of this writing.

Smith attempted to contact Murphy USA regarding the availability and price of gasoline, but was not allowed contact with anyone willing to talk on that subject. Their customer service rep transferred Smith to an answering machine that actually said: “Please wait for the operator. Oops, no operator is available”, then prompted him to leave a message… which was never returned.

As of this writing, according to CBS46.com, Georgia Governor Nathan Deal has declared a state of emergency for 30 Georgia counties near the coast and has issued a mandatory evacuation order for all areas east of I-95, all of Chatham County and some areas west of I-95.

Fetch Your News is a hyper local news outlet that covers Dawson, Lumpkin, White, Fannin, Gilmer, Pickens, Union, Towns and Murray counties as well as Cherokee County in N.C. If you would like to follow up-to-date local events in any of those counties, please visit us at www.FetchYourNews.com

Featured Photo: The category 5 storm slammed into the Caribbean on Wednesday Photo credit: Reuters