Alan Mauldin
MOULTRIE — Tropical Storm Ida is expected to drop rain through much of today, but should not bring heavy winds to Southwest Georgia, a National Weather Service spokesman said.
Road and utility workers were preparing through Monday for the storm and farmers scampered to harvest cotton and peanuts ahead of the storm.
“We’re not expecting a whole lot up your way other than rainfall,” Bryan Mroczka, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service office in Tallahassee, said Monday afternoon.
In Moultrie, rainfall should only amount to a few inches from Monday night through Tuesday, he said. Wind gusts in the range of 20 miles per hour are likely, possibly reaching 30 miles per hour, from the storm expected to make landfall well to the west of Southwest Georgia.
“This is primarily a rain threat with you,” Mroczka said. “Rainfall will linger through the day tomorrow, and it will be breezy at times.”
As of Friday about 55 percent of cotton had been harvested in the county and about 75 percent of peanuts have been dug, Colquitt County Extension agent Scott Brown said. A few inches of rain will not impact cotton significantly at this time unless it is accompanied by heavy winds, he said.
“It all depends on how much rain and how much wind,” Brown said. “It could be very serious on cotton and peanuts. Six inches of rain with no wind, we may lose 100 pounds (per acre of cotton). Six inches of rain and 40 mile-per-hour wind, you’re looking at 300 to 400 pounds.”
Some farmers worked throughout the night to stay ahead of the weather, and Brown estimated that by the time the rain arrived up to 75 percent of cotton could have been gathered. As much as 90 percent of peanuts could have been dug prior to the storm’s arrival.
“We’re probably going to take some hits,” he said. “People have been literally picking cotton around the clock.”
At the Colquitt County Roads and Bridges Department workers were checking equipment ahead of an estimate of two to four inches of rainfall, department Superintendent Charles Weathers said.
At the upper end of that estimate many of the county’s dirt roads would be washed out and some paved roadways would be covered with water, he said. At the lower end the result would be minor washes on dirt roads.
The county maintains 900 miles of roadway, including 360 miles of dirt roads. On Monday crews were checking drainage pipes to make sure they were clear and cleaning ditches so they could handle large amounts of water.
“What we do is try to get ready to go, and then try to react with whatever comes our way,” Weathers said. “You just have to be prepared for the worst and hope for the best.”
Weathers also advised motorists to use common sense and caution when driving.
“If there’s water covering the road, don’t cross it,” he said. “There may be a road there and there might not.”
The county already has spent about $500,000 recovering from spring floods, Weathers said. About half of the road work has been completed.
