Three years on: Newnan still recovering from devastating tornado

NEWNAN, Ga. - Next week will mark the three-year anniversary of the devastating tornado that struck Newnan and Coweta County. Hard to believe that the cleanup continues even now. A tree removal program by the county helped residents get rid of damaged trees that remained a danger. An EF4 tornado hit Newnan with wind speeds over 170 mph on March 26, 2021.

One threat that remained, even years later, was the damaged trees on private property that could fall on homes. To address that, Coweta County Emergency Management officials started a program that was mostly funded by a state grant of a million dollars. The county would pay to remove dangerous trees near a family’s house, but that home had to be within the tornado’s recorded path.

Coweta County says the program lasted more than a year and a half. They took down more than 1,400 dangerous trees on private property. The homeowner had to apply for the program. The trees had to be within 125 feet of their residence. More than 14 trees were taken from one property. They say on average most homeowners had from four to six trees removed.

That program started in September 2022 and just ended this month. Coweta County paid over $300,000 to continue the program when the state’s $1 million ran out and they determined there were still homes threatened by the wind-damaged trees.

The National Weather Service reported that the tornado path was 38 miles long through three counties, and in Coweta County, where the storm damage was the worst, the path was a mile wide as it tore through the city of Newnan. Seventeen-hundred homes were damaged, 70 were destroyed.

There were no injuries and no storm related deaths, although one person died from a medical emergency during the storm, officials said.