Millions of huge invasive spiders from Asia take hold in Georgia: "Like a scene out of 'Arachnophobia'"
CBSN
A large spider native to East Asia has spun its thick, golden web on power lines, porches and vegetable patches all over north Georgia this year — a proliferation that has driven some unnerved homeowners indoors and prompted a flood of anxious social media posts.
In metro Atlanta, Jennifer Turpin — a self-described arachnophobe — stopped blowing leaves in her yard after inadvertently walking into a web created by the Joro spider. Stephen Carter has avoided a walking trail along the Chattahoochee River where he encountered Joro webs every dozen steps.
Farther east in Winterville, Georgia, Will Hudson's front porch became unusable amid an abundance of Joro webs 10 feet deep. Hudson estimates he's killed more than 300 of the spiders on his property.
Ashley White received her earliest combat action badge from the United States Army soon after the first lieutenant arrived in Afghanistan. The silver military award, recognizing soldiers who've been personally engaged by an attacker during conflict, was considered an achievement in and of itself as well as an affirming rite of passage for the newly deployed. White had earned it for using her own body to shield a group of civilian women and children from gunfire that broke out in the midst of her third mission in Kandahar province. All of them survived. She never mentioned the badge to anyone in her battalion.