GILMER COUNTY, Ga. – Schools were closed and dozens of roads were impassable after heavy rains Wednesday morning in Gilmer County.
Rising, moving flood waters from continuous days of rain washed over and under asphalt, taking parts of road away.
"The ground has been saturated and there's a lot of water that has been collecting into the watershed," said Ellijay Police Chief Edward Lacey.
Water rose dangerously close to Ellijay Primary School, but that wasn't the reason officials called off classes.
"We had several landslides that washed out the road and several roads that were flooded that made them impassable to even get the buses out," said Gilmer County Schools Superintendent Shanna Wilkes.
There are three major rivers in Gilmer County that will overflow depending on rainfall patterns, but they aren't the only issues.
"The biggest problem we've had this time has been some of the smaller streams in the more remote portions of the county," said Gilmer County emergency management director Tony Pritchett.
Workers also spent the day clearing around a bridge in Ellijay because the river had washed logs and trees downstream until they couldn't go any further, creating a lake that didn't exist a few days ago. They're removing everything "to keep it from damming up," Lacey said.
"We don't want the debris create a logjam and a dam there to create flooding upstream," Lacey said.
