1st at noon, the Arctic Blast
has arrived in Georgia.
You might have felt it when
you walked outside, right?
It's bringing strong winds,
frosty weather and a chill Georgians
haven't felt in nearly a decade.
Let's take you outside for a live
look at conditions across the country.
That's right,
it's not just gold right here, folks.
Right now, hundreds of millions
of people from coast to coast
are under winter weather alerts,
thousands are without power,
and more than a dozen states
are in emergency response mode.
And here in the metro,
the storm is causing plenty of concern.
About road conditions,
power outages, travel and of course,
your holiday weekend plans.
We have a live team coverage
for you this noon,
bringing you updates and storm
impacts and cleanup and what you
can expect if you're heading to
Atlanta's Hartsfield Jackson
International Airport.
But first,
let's get straight to the man of the hour.
That's meteorologist Chesley
McNeil for your latest forecast.
Thanks a lot, faith.
Let me just say officially, welcome to you.
Welcome to the 11 live family,
and I wish you could be
under warmer circumstances.
Unfortunately, it is not.
We do have the sunshine though.
Plenty of it out there.
You just saw Jerry Carr standing
out there in the sunshine,
but his shoulders were up to his ears
because it is so cold on the outside.
Look at these temperatures.
We're down into the teens, folks.
You would think this would be our start.
Temperatures.
We're in the middle of the day and
temperatures right at 13 degrees in Canton,
17 in Marietta, 16 over in Georgia's Rome,
21 degrees right now in the city of Atlanta.
And I'm thinking that will be our high
for today, or right near 21 degrees.
Now we have the winds out there and
those winds have been gusty up to
about 30 mph so far this morning.
Got up to the 20 mile per hour range
and they're still there this afternoon.
When you factor in these winds
with those temperatures,
this is the way it feels in
your exposed skin,
feels like 0 right now in Marietta,
feels like 1 degree below 0 and Carrollton
feels like 4 degrees below 0 up into Dalton,
feels like 6 degrees below right now
and and Clayton and over toward Canton.
And so it's cold.
There's no way else,
no other way to put it.
Folks, you have to bundle up,
layer up yourself if you're
going to be going out,
especially going to spend some
time outside this afternoon.
We have a dangerous wind chills
out there because of this.
Up here to the north,
you see our northernmost counties
will say from Floyd over to Cherokee
and looks like into Forsyth County.
Northward is where you gonna see those
wind chills up to about 20 degrees
below 0 here in the metro area and
southward 5 to 9 degrees below 0.
This is where we have the
wind chill advisory.
Now these,
this warning and advisory will last
until noon on Saturday because
we're expecting those temperatures
to fall off once again tonight.
Back down into the single digits
in a lot of spots.
We got the clear skies going
to hold on to it.
We'll see some clouds moving
into the area by 11:00 o'clock.
Tonight they won't overtake the area.
We'll get the sunshine back
in here again tomorrow.
But again, that cold air mass is in place.
So look at temperatures right at 19.
Well, we started out in 19,
but looking at 21 degrees for the afternoon,
high temperature will drop down to
15 degrees by 7:00 o'clock tonight.
Will it really, really,
really,
really frigid is what I'm trying to say.
Getting frigid myself here.
We'll see those temperatures again
fall off to about 10 degrees
tonight and then we'll do it
all over again for tomorrow.
It's going to be cold all weekend long.
More information on that coming up.
I feel you on that Chesley.
That's how I was when I walked outside.
This morning it couldn't even talk because
it was so cold when that wind hit my face.
And with all of these winter
weather conditions in place,
there is plenty of concern about
the roads and potential for black
ice as well as downed trees.
Now overnight we received several
reports of downed trees and different
parts of the metro and 11 alives.
Jerry Carnes is live now
on Joseph E Lowery Blvd.
In northwest Atlanta.
Hey Jerry, how's it looking out?
Well, good afternoon Faye.
This section of Joseph E Lowery Blvd.
has been closed since about 4:00
o'clock this morning. Take a look.
You can see where crews continue
to work to clear this tree that
came down across the roadway,
took down power lines,
took down power poles and even
took down a traffic light.
Cleanup here is going to take quite a while,
and this is far from the only
spot in Metro Atlanta battered
and damaged by powerful winds.
Atlanta's winter blast was both
cruel and kind to Takisha Johnson.
She arrived home from her overnight
shift at work, preparing to
crawl into bed with her daughter.
When it happened, I just heard a big.
Big loud noise and this
what happened right here.
The bitter cold wind stabbed her home
with the limb of a tree piercing the roof.
It came right through the ceiling of a
bedroom where her daughter was sound asleep,
close to where she was laying down.
Yeah, yeah. Hmm.
I guess you're just thankful it didn't
fall all the way through to her.
Yes. Yes. Very thankful.
When this tree fell across
Joseph E Lowery Blvd.
Anthony Harper knew right
away what had happened.
Everything went off.
The lights, heat, everything went off.
And what do you do after that?
I
just sit there and pray to God,
hoping everything come back
on hope no one was hurt.
With the power out,
neighbors turned to layers to stay warm.
We ain't got no power,
so now I can't eat my food.
We gonna sport in Noonan.
Two people went to the
hospital with minor injuries.
Homes were damaged,
cars destroyed.
When winds brought down trees.
Here on Westwood Ave.
in northwest Atlanta,
winds toppled this tree,
pulling it up by the roots.
It blocked the street,
but spared nearby homes.
Neighbors were thankful for that.
Very thankful while Takisha
Johnson gives thanks for the
child who survived the bitter
bite of this winter storm.
And to Keisha Johnson's daughter
is now with her grandmother,
safe and sound and hopefully warm,
while the family waits for
someone to help them patch
a giant hole in their roof.
Back to you. Alright,
thanks so much for that report, Jerry.
OK, here's a live look now at the
current Georgia Power outage map.
You can see problems across the metro.
Thousands are without power,
the agency reporting
more than 10,000 outages.
And we're told right now crews
are assessing how widespread the
damage is so they can distribute
resources and get to work getting
the power and the heat back on.
So even before our crews are
able to get out in the field,
our automated systems are working
in the background to reroute
power where possible and get a
number of customers back on.
We've already seen our,
our totals drop significantly
just in the past few hours,
our total outages now they'll,
they'll go up and down because
these winds are still out there
and you'll see additional things
happen throughout the day.
Here are some important information.
If you see a downed power line,
assume it's live. Don't touch it.
Report it to the power company
so crews can come and fix it.
OK, it's Christmas Eve Eve, right?
So you might be headed to the airport
just in time for those holiday plans.
And that's one of the busiest,
if not the busiest right now in the nation.
But it seems Mother Nature did
not get the memo. 11 lives.
Brittany Kleinpeter is there,
and she's been at Hartsfield
Jackson International Airport.
All morning long monitoring the conditions,
she joins us live now in Brittany.
I woke up this morning to you saying
that there were plenty of cancellations.
How is that impacting travelers right now?
So we're still seeing those
cancellations trickle in and you know
snow is not really an issue here,
but airport officials definitely still
keeping the eye on the system because we
are seeing it trickle into the flights
coming in and out of Hartsfield Jackson.
So right now, according to FlightAware,
we have more than 100 flights
have been cancelled so far and
just over 250 have been delayed.
We're told today is supposed
to be the worst travel day.
Some airlines like Delta,
which is based out of Atlanta have tried
to cancel flights as early as possible.
To avoid customers coming all
the way to the airport,
travelers we spoke to say they
made sure to arrive extra early
in anticipation of delays,
but they say so far so good.
We're headed to Jamaica,
to the warmer place, yes.
Escaping all this freezing weather right now.
Yeah, I think it's going pretty smooth.
Maybe it'll become,
it'll change later on during the day, yeah.
But right now it went very well.
Airport officials are still recommending
come 2 1/2 to 3 hours early if you're
in a wheelchair or you have an infant
at an extra 30 minutes to that time.
But right now, we're still seeing moderate
lines at check-ins and TSA checkpoints.
But, you know, always plan ahead. They.
All right, Brittany,
thanks so much for that report.
And you know what?
Jamaica doesn't sound too
bad just about now, OK?