Trees That Kill

[Mr A]

Seems every so often, I read about another tree that killed somebody. I hear about these stories probably once or twice every few years. So much for a picnic in the shade.
(broken link removed to http://news.yahoo.com/teen-injured-calif-camp-heard-crack-screaming-233636092.html)

 

[mywaynow]

A good sized campground near me was closed for good over a falling tree. Huge Sycamore dropped on a camper in the middle of the night.killing him instantly. Unstable ground from silt content was blamed, along with root rot. Shame all around; loss of life, loss of access to campers.

 

[bmblank]

A traverse city tree trimmer for a power company died just the other day. I heard on the news he was warned a couple of times that he was getting to close to the power lines. He didn't heed those warnings. I assume he was a young, rookie of a trimmer.

 

[oldspark]

Several years ago a camper on RAGBRAI was killed by a large Silver Maple branch that fell on his tent.

 

[Grisu]

I think about two years ago a classmate of my son lost her father through a tree accident. He was running a commercial sugar maple operation and checking on his lines. I don't know whether it was a tree or just a branch that killed him but he left a wife and three kids. Since then I am really alert when the wind goes through the trees in my yard.

 

[Flatbedford]

A pregnant woman was killed by a tree in NYC last week. She was sitting in a park bench, tree fell on her.

 

[charly]

From doing tree work years ago,, I see silent killers , all along the sides of the roads... I guess no one cares to go out and get rid of the accidents waiting to happen.. When they fall, then they clean it up , along with any unlucky people ...guess they just call it an act of God...

 

[Backwoods Savage]

From doing tree work years ago,, I see silent killers , all along the sides of the roads... I guess no one cares to go out and get rid of the accidents waiting to happen.. When they fall, then they clean it up , along with any unlucky people ...guess they just call it an act of God...

Charly, I was thinking about this just yesterday. With all the dead ash, I was taking notice when I had to make a short trip. It is amazing how many dead ash are along side of roads; busy roads too. My bet is that nobody will do a thing until they fall. Of course then the news people will blame it on a bad storm....

 

[ScotO]

I'm always scanning the roadsides, parks and neighborhoods for bad trees like that....and I see them all the time. Ticking time bombs, a lot of them. In public places I think that the local governing bodies (the tax collecting locality) should most definitely be responsible for bad (dead or otherwise) trees along public roads, parks, etc. That said, any property that is open to the public should be responsible for keeping the dead trees in precarious places to a minimum. I'm amazed when I go through the city next to our town and see huge standing deads right along busy roadways/parks. Makes me mad.

 

[charly]

Charly, I was thinking about this just yesterday. With all the dead ash, I was taking notice when I had to make a short trip. It is amazing how many dead ash are along side of roads; busy roads too. My bet is that nobody will do a thing until they fall. Of course then the news people will blame it on a bad storm....

A ton of standing dead elm around here...what a waste to let it rot besides become a road side hazard! I would love to create a team of local folks to share the removal of hazard road side trees and then share the firewood! That would save lives and insurance claims! We'd all be warm too

 

[gzecc]

I was just getting back to my car at a friends farm a few years ago and a brance the size of my calf fell righ behind me. The little branches and leaves just grazed me. That was close.

 

[NortheastAl]

Charly, I was thinking about this just yesterday. With all the dead ash, I was taking notice when I had to make a short trip. It is amazing how many dead ash are along side of roads; busy roads too. My bet is that nobody will do a thing until they fall. Of course then the news people will blame it on a bad storm....

The dead Ash trees are going to be a big concern. And you're right, no one will do anything preventative. They set out traps for the beetles last year, but that'll be about all. It took Sandy to make the power company cut back tree limbs here. They used to do it and we rarely had outages for years after. You'd think after tropical storm Irene, they would have known. Saving money by not trimming is counterproductive to the bottom line. Still, they won't learn. It'll be at least another decade and a major storm before they come around again.

 

[charly]

I use to do line clearance work... You have people crying about tree removals even around the power lines.. A losing battle... People and trees are a funny combination when it comes to cutting them... If we saw a nice tree in front of a residential house that we'd be trimming, we'd do a courtesy knock on their door to tell them we will trim to less then required set backs and if the forester approves the trim afterwards for the line clearance it's good to go..Just so we didn't take off a lot below the lines..I forget the specs off hand.. I can't tell you how many times no one came to the door, but unbelievable came out of the house and bitched after we cut the tree to the normal line clearance specs... People were unbelievable.. We have a 30 foot dead elm about 5 miles from here, half over the road with probably 10 main stems all starting to break off. 3 have already been in the road... Tree hasn't even been tagged for a removal by anyone... When I was on the State DOT Tree Crew, trees for removal were marked in front of the tree out on the road by a green paint dot.. Leaving a tree marked with an X for removal and mean while falling on someone was a law suit for knowing the tree was a hazard and leaving it.. I see big 40 ft Oaks leaning on hillsides all the time over power lines and roads here... People think they are anchored 8 feet in the ground.....Surprise!

 

[NortheastAl]

I use to do line clearance work... You have people crying about tree removals even around the power lines.. A losing battle... People and trees are a funny combination when it comes to cutting them... If we saw a nice tree in front of a residential house that we'd be trimming, we'd do a courtesy knock on their door to tell them we will trim to less then required set backs and if the forester approves the trim afterwards for the line clearance it's good to go..Just so we didn't take off a lot below the lines..I forget the specs off hand.. I can't tell you how many times no one came to the door, but unbelievable came out of the house and bitched after we cut the tree to the normal line clearance specs... People were unbelievable.. We have a 30 foot dead elm about 5 miles from here, half over the road with probably 10 main stems all starting to break off. 3 have already been in the road... Tree hasn't even been tagged for a removal by anyone... When I was on the State DOT Tree Crew, trees for removal were marked in front of the tree out on the road by a green paint dot.. Leaving a tree marked with an X for removal and mean while falling on someone was a law suit for knowing the tree was a hazard and leaving it.. I see big 40 ft Oaks leaning on hillsides all the time over power lines and roads here... People think they are anchored 8 feet in the ground.....Surprise!

Charly, I have a fairly big Honey Locust in the front yard that grew out into the power line. When they trimmed it, of course, the shape was not a pretty as before, but I was glad they trimmed it to keep power up in our neighborhood. About 10 years back they trimmed two trees alongside my driveway that were touching my lines and the ones that ran to my neighbor. They were so intertwined I asked it they would like to take the whole of the two trees down. They said they couldn't do that, Oslo I hired a tree service to take them both out. I used to think it was nice to have all those trees around my house. We had a tornado hit in '89 and it took out 11 trees on the property. I was grateful only one hit the house. Some people don't understand that as nice as trees are to have, they can be very dangerous.

 

[charly]

Charly, I have a fairly big Honey Locust in the front yard that grew out into the power line. When they trimmed it, of course, the shape was not a pretty as before, but I was glad they trimmed it to keep power up in our neighborhood. About 10 years back they trimmed two trees alongside my driveway that were touching my lines and the ones that ran to my neighbor. They were so intertwined I asked it they would like to take the whole of the two trees down. They said they couldn't do that, Oslo I hired a tree service to take them both out. I used to think it was nice to have all those trees around my house. We had a tornado hit in '89 and it took out 11 trees on the property. I was grateful only one hit the house. Some people don't understand that as nice as trees are to have, they can be very dangerous.

Al,
First home we built in the woods, I used the stick method to check all the trees around my house.. Any that sighted with the stick as to reaching my house came down... Years later we had an ice storm with no worries. Take any stick in your hand, grip it. With your arm straight out, bend your wrist back towards your eye, adjusting the length so the stick while in your hand just touches below your eye.. Now hold the stick with arm straight out and the stick straight up. Your at a 90 degree angle.. Walk back until you can see the base of the tree at the top of your hand where the stick exits your hand , at the same time keep walking back until you can also see the top of the tree at the top of the stick.. Once you can see both the base and the top of the tree at both ends of the stick, you feet are marking where the top of the tree will be if it was cut or up rooted... I used it a lot dropping trees , when dropping trees just have the top of your hand at your face cut area and the top of the stick at the top of the tree.. Works great as to know where the top will wind up...

 

[charly]

Here ya go Al!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=4HRVsoM9bxc

 

[NortheastAl]

Here ya go Al!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=4HRVsoM9bxc

Thanks, Charly. The video cleared up any confusion I had for how to use the stick. Going to see if the house is in the fall zone of too many of our trees. I know there is at least a few.

Thanks again.

 

[Mr A]

Here is a tree growing over a play structure at a elementary school. It's oak with a long crack on a big heavy looking upper branch.

 

[charly]

Here is a tree growing over a play structure at a elementary school. It's oak with a long crack on a big heavy looking upper branch.

That should be pointed out to the school... I few times doing residential work I looked over in the next yard only to see a big hanger in a tree above a swing set .. I alerted the neighbor not looking for work but just to give them a heads up.. Most people never look up...

 

[Flatbedford]

. We had a tornado hit in '89 and it took out 11 trees on the property. I was grateful only one hit the house. Some people don't understand that as nice as trees are to have, they can be very dangerous.

Is that the storm that hit Carmel? Didn't go through a condo or town home development?

 

[NortheastAl]

Is that the storm that hit Carmel? Didn't go through a condo or town home development?

Yep, that's the one. Drove branches through the walls and roof of my house. Took the top floors off the condos at King's Grant in Carmel. Never thought it could happen in NY.

 

[Flatbedford]

Yup! That was crazy. I lived in Somers at the time and it was quite a shock to have something like that in the area.

 

[save$]

We had our home built in the woods, took only one hurricane to convince me that it was luck that that big tree missed our home. After that we started taking any trees down that looked like they could crash onto our house. Glad to say they are all gone now. Don't miss them one bit. Still have many trees in the surround woods.

 

[Flatbedford]

I had some kind of Maple tree right next to my house. It was a two stem tree right on the property line, and grown through the power lines. The first year we lived in the house a storm was forecast for the area and I called the power company to ask if they could clear the tree from the wires to prevent the storm from taking the wires down. They told me that they don't do that, but would be happy to repair the wires if there was damage. Thanks for nothing. I asked my tree guy about taking it down and he didn't even want to do it because of the wires.
A few years later, a crew came through the neighborhood and marked a bunch of trees for trimming/removal. They marked the smaller stem for removal. I went out and bought a spool of ribbon and tied it around the other stem. A week or so later an Asplundh crew cam and cut the whole thing down and did a bunch of trimming on my street. A couple months later, a tree down the street fell and took down all the wires. We had no power for almost a week. So much for the trimming.

 

[Mr A]

That should be pointed out to the school... I few times doing residential work I looked over in the next yard only to see a big hanger in a tree above a swing set .. I alerted the neighbor not looking for work but just to give them a heads up.. Most people never look up...

It was easy enough to look up the name of the school and get the principles email address. He wrote back within the hour thanking me for pointing it out. I did ask to come get the branch once it's cut.