Tragedy struck Pickens County over the weekend when a home explosion on Highway 53 West near Ludville left a woman with life-threatening injuries. The incident, which happened around 2:30 p.m. on Saturday, resulted in Shelly Harlan, a 62-year-old woman, being airlifted to Grady Memorial Hospital's burn unit; Harlan, who is in critical condition, suffered burns over sixty percent of her body, as reported by FOX 5 Atlanta.
Following the disaster, Harlan has been placed on a ventilator at the hospital and is only able to communicate through simple gestures, Rebecca McClure, the owner of Annie's Restaurant where Harlan has worked for the past four years, recalled the harrowing moment they discovered the accident "We got the phone call Saturday about three that the house had exploded, and they were airlifting her to Grady's burn unit," and from what she can gather, Harlan remembers being inside at the time of the explosion, but her ability to share is limited to blinks due to her current state, McClure said in an interview with FOX 5 Atlanta.
The Pickens County community has shown immense support for Harlan, with people offering financial support and other aid; McClure has even set up a checking account in Harlan's name at a community bank to speed up the process of getting help to her, as stated by FOX 5 Atlanta.
In a separate but related incident, Pickens County Fire Rescue, led by Chief Tim Prather, had a challenging task, deploying multiple attack lines to combat another blaze and dealing with potential heat exhaustion among the crew, a battle that lasted approximately four hours, during which one firefighter was transported to a medical facility with heat exhaustion symptoms, according to Smoke Signals News; mutual aid was called from neighboring counties to help extinguish the fire completely, bringing in assistance from volunteers and personnel who worked to secure the area.
