High winds in Ga. lead to downed power lines, outages - Atlanta News, Weather, Traffic, and Sports | FOX 5

High winds moved in to the metro area on Sunday, toppling trees and power lines as Hurricane Sandy made its way up the Eastern Seaboard.

The strong winds continued on Monday, prompting the National Weather Service  to issue a high wind watch that included extreme northeastern Georgia.

Forecasters say winds gusting up to 55 mph could damage trees and cause power outages. The weather service says sustained winds will increase to 25 mph and linger through Tuesday evening.

A tree in Milton came crashing down on Monday afternoon, knocking out power to many residents, including 75-year-old Hamp Phillips. He lives with his 94-year-old mother, who is confined to a bed and is on oxygen. Firefighters brought him a generator while they worked to restore the power.

The tree was one of the largest in Steven Chow's front yard. He moved to Milton last year from New York City and most of his family is still in Long Island. While he surveyed the damage in his own yard, he thought about his family up north.

"We don't know what is going to happen because they said this is the mother of all storms," Chow said.

In Stone Mountain, the bedroom of one home took a direct hit from a falling tree. No one was home at the time. But the house is in need of some major repairs.

Paulding, Clarke, and Fulton counties also reported downed power lines, but no major outages on Sunday.

The whipping winds caused several trees to come crashing down in southwest Atlanta on Monday. One of them toppled down onto a house on Pryor Road. Emergency crews also had their hands full on Grand Avenue and on Veltre Circle where here trees fell down, scattering power lines across the road.

Employees in Georgia Power's storm center are keeping an eye out for any weather related problems that might crop up. At the same time, they are coordinating assistance to the utility companies on the eastern seaboard bracing for Hurricane Sandy.

"Our storm center stays on top of things, and we're ready to go. Our customers are the number one priority. At this time we're watching the reports, saying that we're going to be ready to take action if we need to here in Georgia," said Brian Green of Georgia Power.

Employees and the Georgia Power storm center are keeping an eye out for weather-related problems that might crop up in Georgia. At the same time, they are coordinating assistance to with utility crews on the eastern seaboard who are bracing for Hurricane Sandy.

"We've got 340 employees. The first wave left on Sunday. We got them to Richmond last night. We had a second wave of employees leave this morning about 6:00 a.m., and our goal is to get them to Raleigh, North Carolina," said Green.

Georgia Power reported 900 customers in metro Atlanta were without power as of 10 p.m., down from 2,500 earlier. Georgia Power says 2,000 customers have no electricity statewide.

The Associated Press contributed to this article