Gaston County Bracing for Debby

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — “This is what public safety prepares for.”

Scott Hunter, the director of Gaston County Emergency Management, says his teams have been working around the clock this week as Debby draws near.

“The primary two issues that were expecting would be the trees down, due to the winds, and of course, the saturation, and then the rain,” Hunter adds.

And there’s going to be a lot of rain. Your WCCB Weather team is calling for 2-4” to fall in Gaston County through Saturday morning, inundating roads, yards, and rivers.

“We’ve been proactively moving water through our system, through our hydro assets, trying to create storage so that our legs can handle the rain when it comes,” says Ben Williamson with Duke Energy.

“It’s going to be really the lower Catawba that we’re worried about.”

Cramerton is one of the communities both Duke Energy and Gaston County are keeping a close eye on. The town is no stranger to flooding from the South Fork Catawba River, which frequently overflows its banks in heavy storms. Power outages are also a concern with any landfalling tropical system, but Duke Energy has 7500 crews across the Carolinas ready to keep the lights on – and their self-healing technology is only getting better.

“The technology kind of acts like a GPS, right? So if there’s a power outage, instead of those folks, losing power, the power will automatically reroute itself, like a GPS does, find another way,” says Williamson, “That really reduces the number of outages.”

But if your power does go out, let the professionals take care of it.

“If a line falls in your yard or a tree falls, don’t try to do anything with it yourself,” says Chief David Toomey with the Lucia-Riverbend Fire Department, “Call 911 and let us come out there and assess the situation and help you get everything taken care of.”

And, always remember:

“Turn around, don’t drown,” Toomey adds. “[You] need to take heed to that, [you] really do. Because it’ll save your life.”