Hundreds of Homes in GA Destroyed by a series of Mothers Day Tornado's

Hundreds of homeowners will be cleaning up Monday in Clayton, Douglas and Carroll counties after at least a half-dozen twisters raked the state Sunday, including three in metro Atlanta.

In the hard-hit neighborhoods of northeast Clayton, dozens of county prison inmates were brought in to help as work began in earnest.

Huge blue tarps flapped in the breeze on the roofs of houses in the Stagecoach Village subdivision Monday morning as the inmates filled several dump trucks parked along the streets.

Several private contractors were also in the area, starting repairs on some of the damaged homes.

The storms left a Mother's Day nightmare of hundreds of damaged homes and downed trees, tens of thousands of families without electricity, and at least one reported death, in Dublin, in Middle Georgia.

By 8:30 a.m. Monday, about 1,600 metro Atlanta customers and 43,000 statewide still were without electricity. At the height of the outages, 253,000 Georgia Power customers were in the dark. Georgia Power spokesman Jeff Wilson said the utility had 980 people, including crews from Alabama Power, working to restore electricity.

The utility initially said it would have all power in the Atlanta area restored Sunday night, but later had to back off from that promise. High winds late Sunday had Georgia Power crews "going in circles," said Wilson. "We get one [area] fixed, and another goes down."

Winds gusting to 30 mph and higher continued to plague repair crews at daybreak Monday.

"As long as the wind is high, we'll continue to see outages," Wilson said.

Monday morning's high winds toppled trees onto several roads, blocking Riverside Drive and Johnson Ferry Road in north Fulton County during the early stages of the rush hour.

West of Atlanta, school officials in Carroll County canceled classes on Monday because of storm damage. Faculty and staff were asked to report at regular times, according to the school system's Web site.

Nationally, at least 22 people were killed in three states over the weekend as tornadoes tore across the Plains and the South. At least 15 died in southwestern Missouri, and at least six were killed in Picher, Okla.

On Sunday afternoon in Duluth, a woman died when high winds that blew in on the heels of the storm caused the top of a tree to snap and fall on her as she was walking shortly before 5 p.m. in the Chatelaine Park Apartments.

Gov. Sonny Perdue declared a state of emergency in Bibb, Carroll, Douglas, Jefferson, Johnson and Laurens counties.

The storm touched 19 Georgia counties, but hit an area from Clayton County south to Macon the hardest.

About three miles south-southwest of Dublin, an unidentified man in his early 50s was killed and his wife sustained "very critical" injuries when a twister destroyed a double-wide mobile home, the National Weather Service reported. The couple's two children also were hurt but were expected to live.

At Macon State College, roofs were sheared on two of its campus buildings, and the tree canopy was devastated, said Bill Weaver, a college spokesman. Part of the gymnasium's roof was blown off, damaging adjacent tennis courts. Roofing materials were stripped from the student life center, leaving bare plywood.

Weaver estimated that 70 percent of the trees on campus were snapped off or uprooted. "We had a lot of pine trees on the campus. It's really going to change the landscape of the campus, unfortunately," he said.

Most of the college's 6,500 students were not attending classes this month, and the buildings were unoccupied when the tornado came through, Weaver said.

At the University of West Georgia in Carrollton, which lost about 100 trees and sustained mostly roof and door damage to five buildings, the storm hit one day after four commencement ceremonies. None of the school's 10,500 students were on campus Sunday morning, spokeswoman Lisa Ledbetter said.

"This is the first time we've had such widespread damage," said Glenn Allen, spokesman for state Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine, who is sending representatives to affected areas today and hopes to have damage estimates by day's end.

In Clayton County, officials reported 173 homes damaged, 43 of them uninhabitable. In Carroll County, authorities placed the number of damaged homes at more than 100 along a line of up to 35 miles that stretched northeast from Bowdon.

Fulton reported only a handful of damaged homes but numerous downed trees and power lines. In Douglas County, downed trees closes some roads and damage was reported early Sunday to homes and cars in two subdivisions, including St. Andrews Country Club.

As he left Waco, Texas, on Sunday, President Bush said, "We send our prayers to those who lost their lives, the families of those who lost their lives.... The federal government will be moving hard to help. I'll be in touch with the governors to offer all the federal assistance we can."

Bush had been at his ranch this weekend for the wedding of his daughter, Jenna.

The president later called Perdue to offer his condolences and to talk about Georgia's needs for recovery.

The Weather Service reported the following tornado touchdowns:

-- Carroll and Douglas counties - two tornadoes, 4:10 a.m.

-- Clayton, Henry, Rockdale and Newton counties, 5:10 a.m.

-- Bibb and Twiggs counties, 5:50 a.m.

-- Laurens County, 6:36 a.m.

-- Toombs County, 7:25 a.m.

Additional tornadoes may have struck Fulton County, along with Johnson, Treutlen and Troup counties, the Weather Service said.

Residents in the hard-hit subdivisions in the Stagecoach, Panola and Rex roads area of Ellenwood in Clayton figured out early on what it took the Weather Service most of the day to determine.

"It was not the wind. There's no way. It had to be a tornado," said Mila Freeman, whose family is staying with relatives after their home was among the severely damaged in Ellenwood's Stagecoach Village subdivision.

Neighbor Jennifer Barker said she was awakened by "the worst sound I've ever heard."

"I couldn't move from where I was. I didn't know what to do. It was horrible."

Her home took a relatively minor hit, with damage to shingles and siding. Like many residents, she focused on the lack of injuries.

"It may not be the Mother's Day you wanted, but we have a lot to be thankful for," Barker said. "We're still alive."