SEVERE WEATHER
County sees downed trees, heavy rainfall, but spared worst of state’s severe weather
Storms that swept through the state early Monday knocked trees onto several Garland County roadways but mostly spared the county from damage other parts of the state experienced.
The National Weather Service’s North Little Rock office said wind speeds reached 41 mph at Hot Springs Memorial Field shortly after 1 a.m, noting that a downed tree near Charlton Recreational Area in west Garland County was the extent of the county’s storm report.
The county’s Department of Emergency Management said several reports of trees across roadways were called into the Garland County 911 Communications Center. DEM Director Bo Robertson said dispatchers logged reports of trees blocking roadways in the central, east and south parts of the county.
He said state Parks Department workers removed a tree blocking traffic in the 2600 block of Mountain Pine Road near Preston Lane. The county road department cleared trees and debris from the
1200 block of Cedar Glades Road, the 2900 block of Little Blakely Creek Road east of Lake Ouachita and the intersection of Amity Road and Liz Lane in south Garland County. Downed trees blocking Highway 7 north near Randallwood Drive were also reported.
Robertson said there were no reports of property damage like the storm left in other parts of the state, including northwest Arkansas, where the National Weather Service reported a fatality caused by a tree falling through a home in Rogers.
Meteorologist Travis Shelton of the National Weather Service’s North Little Rock office said the storms were part of the cold front that produced the tornado that raked the Dallas area late Sunday. Warm air ahead of the front created favorable conditions for severe weather as the system moved east into Arkansas, Shelton said, as much of the state was under a tornado watch late Sunday through early Monday.
More than an inch of rain fell on the county. Entergy Arkansas Inc.’s rain gauge at Big Mazarn Creek near Highway 227 reported 1.48 inches. Gauges at Carpenter and Remmel dams collected 1.33 and 2.07 inches, respectively. To the north, the gauge at East Gulpha Creek on Bald Mountain Road received a 0.91 inch total.