By MARY BAILEY The Reporter
Strong winds and heavy rain ripped through Marshall County Sunday evening and into Monday morning and although we were spared from much of the destruction like surrounding states received, one Albertville family received significant damage to their home.
Lindsey Carter Alford and her family were home when the storms came around 4 a.m. Monday morning and had little time to react.
“I had woken up and was looking outside at the storms and watched pieces of my roof fly into our swimming pool,” Alford said. “We got our kids up and went into the center room in our house. It happened so quickly.”
Alford’s roof was peeled back like a banana and partially ripped off during the storms. They also have significant water damage to the inside of their home, but they are very thankful that they are all safe.
Marshall County EMA Director, Blake Farmer said there were no tornadoes confirmed in the county.
The highest wind gusts according to the National Weather Service at the Albertville Airport were 36 miles per hour Monday morning during the peak of the storm.
“Once the storms came through, we had flash flooding, downed trees, damages to some powerlines. It also washed out some cross drains,” according to Farmer.
He said as of Tuesday morning, Davis Road off AL 68 is closed other than to local traffic and George Wallace Drive (Albertville) is closed from GraStone Apartments to Mathis Mill Road, both in District 4.
Farmer said compared to the damages and loss of life surrounding states suffered over the holiday weekend, we are very fortunate.
With the NOAA already predicting an 85% chance that this year’s hurricane season will be more active than normal, Farmer said to make sure you have more than one way to receive weather notifications and a safety plan for your family.
“All 62 sirens in Marshall County, as far as we know, fired,” Farmer continued. “During the severe weather event, the text messages for our alert system worked well, but we had one issue with it not calling people. I’m not real sure what’s going on, but I have that on my agenda to do today. There again, that’s why you need multiple ways to receive notifications.”
To sign up to receive alerts from the Marshall County EMA, visit www.marshallcoema.org.
