A Branch Falls & Someone Dies

TreeSpecialist

See the attached news story. A redwood sheds a branch in San Francisco.

cbs5.com - Woman Dead After Tree Falls On Her At SF Park


This case calls into question a variety of things.

1) What happened to the evidence (the broken limb)? Was is quickly cleaned up and disposed of?

2) Park tree - when was it last inspected? When was it last worked on? Who worked on it? Did they know the difference between a collar cut and a flush cut?

As I observe and study why trees fall apart, I find most (not all) limb failures were caused by man (either directly or indirectly) and not by Nature.

Sure, the occasional severe storm can topple or break even the strongest limb, fork, or entire tree, but the root cause of the limb or trunk failure can frequently be traced back to bad tree work.

More than 25 years ago, Shigo convinced me the "phenomena of summer limb drop" was probably caused by bad work. Over the next 4 months, I dissected 60 limbs that dropped without warning, usually in the evening and with no wind.

I found flush cuts at the base of 58 of 60 the limb failures - many were buried deep within the limbs.

Communities around the world have a legal responsibility to inspect and care for trees in public spaces. In my part of the world, the City has over 2,000 miles of street trees and 16,000 acres of park trees and about 8 employees to keep up with them.

Trees are neither inspected nor pruned on any kind of regular program.

The poor woman who died in San Francisco may have been the victim of poor work or a failure to inspect.

What you see happening in your community?

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TreeDimensional

TS last July we had a couple of severe weather events in our part of the world. I must concur with your assessment of the human involvement in a lot of failures, but not all. The failures not caused by direct (Pruning) human involvement, can often be contributed to in-attention to the growth of trees. Again, no target, no risk.

The one thing that I found alarming was the number of failures at old pruning wounds. Most, if not all the failures, at the pruning site were cut by the power corporations own untrained (in arboriculture or forestry) utility employees. These employees, in rural Saskatchewan are more-or-less jack of all trades workers. One day they might be installing a meter box, the next they would be replacing a pole cross-member....... they are often called in to remove limbs, with little or no training to access the future impact of their actions.

We have been involved with other storms, where 14" diameter spruce trunks have been snapped straight across, 12' off the ground. I try to NEVER forget that mother nature holds ALL the cards. The second thing I consider when asked to remove a large limb (mismanaged tree) is "what will happen when this tree compatimentalizes this wound (or not), am I creating more of a hazard"?

This is always a slippery slope, and things can be done to abate the risks. BUT the owner of the tree has to be the one to accept the risk. Our jobs as arborists is to explain ALL the options, in an UNBIASED manner, to let the tree owner make a decision. All to often that decision is based on what the pocket book dictates.

I am very sorry to hear of a person being killed by a tree that she has probably parked beside before, she no doubt used that park to run the dog because of the esthetic beauty, and the shelter it gave them from mother natures wind. This is very sad!

Eric Frei

When people are invited beneath trees with paths, car parks etc there's a very strong onus on the property owner/lessee's duty of care for safety.

Only an investigation will show the cause. Many similar situations here, lucky no-one has been killed, if the owner has little in the way of tree surveys or regular checks in high value and target locations then if I were a lawyer I'd cook their asses.

Not too hard to zone up high risk areas, start with big trees, public places, carparks etc ... not rocket science.

Big trees fail. Old over mature trees fail. The consequences of such a lot worse than regular trees. As trees get older they dont get better or stronger, they all eventually enter the decline phase.

The inspection of such trees very costly, huge towers required etc. Inspect some 200'+ tree in a park or roadside carpark ... slow and costly.

The start of my thinking for locations like that is nothing below the drip line.

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TreeDimensional

Oh, don't get me wrong Ekka, I believe that there is someone to blame. With urban parks there is always politics going on. Here is a link to the gong-show that happened in Vancouver last year. CTV.ca | B.C.'s Stanley Park loses 1,000 trees after storm

The Clay (as Ekka would say) still hasn't be sifted yet.

There are pages of related follow-up, Tree companies even volunteered to help and the city worker union put a STOP to that. Hence the term gong-show.

newguy18

Its always sad to hear about tree related deaths[or any death for that matter].Judging by how badly smashed the vehicle was i'd say it was a fairly good sized limb.I notice they didn't mention if it was dead or rotten.i've cut some oak limbs while removing them[big oak 6' in diameter,my biggest td to date] I cut one that waas 18" fdiameter and the innermost 6" was so soft i could put my finger through it without much trouble.One thing i'm always trying to explain to people,just because it has leaves on it doesn't mean its a good solid tree.

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old schooler

TreeDimensional

I was able to stop the video on the frame where it showed the break-out on the main stem, and a quick look at the limb in the truck. There didn't appear to be any discoloration of the limb ends.

Does anyone know of any software that can copy media like the stuff in TS's link?

Based on the damage to the SUV, I think there was probably more tree than they showed in the back of the service truck. Funny thing about investigations, VERY few people get to see the results. Of course this happened in the US so I would bet there will be litigation, I hope I live long enough to hear the results of the ruling.

TreeSpecialist

here's another one.......


Woman struck by tree dies

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Eric Frei

Yeah, they dont even have to be that big to kill you.

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bigshea13

Impaled By A Tree Branch Video - Metacafe

Man impaled by tree branch | thedaily.com.au
Fallen tree kills woman : Local News : Knoxville News Sentinel
watch the end of this one:Video Player Beta
and finally..........the image

Attached Thumbnails

 

mdvaden

Not every time, but often in late spring and summer, I notice that limbs fall due to swollen wood shrinking in a decayed socket. In winter it's wet and swollen, and fits tight - same principle as oak barrels sealing when wet.

Warm weather arrives, the decayed wet wood shrinks, then falls. And more will fall with a following rain, that saturates the exposed limb with water weight, but not the protected pieced dried in the protected socket.

Each season has it's little things.

RandyMac

Redwoods are notorious for shedding limbs, most are not big enough to crush a car, but enough to ruin your day. Major limb/top failure is very common, like Ekka said the older they are, they are more prone to failure. Should you ever visit the Redwoods, one of the things you will notice, is the large amount of debris on the ground, ranging from mere twigs, to limbs large enough to send to the mill. Besides the vast amount of rotten Redwoods to inspect, you have the usual public outcry about even thinking of touching one in a park.
Newguy has a video about falling Redwoods, you can see the falling crews run for their lives, the minute one of those trees comes off verticle, crap rains from the sky. Come to think about it, I saw very few of the trees I felled, actually hit the ground, I was too busy running away.

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RandyMac

Eric Frei

You have to respect the big trees and give them room.

Those redwoods are huge trees, monsters, some limb from 100' up hitting you is a real bad thing.

Amazing isn't it, I bet it only feels like yesterday felling big trees, sort of like some pioneering spirit and heroism, now a days they try to make you feel like some planet plucker.

Up Alaska they still do a lot of big tree felling in summer, forget the type of trees but I'd be giving it a go for sure, MS660 with 32" bar, bring it on!

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RandyMac

Yes, it does indeed seem like yesterday.

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RandyMac

Therrin

Wow Randy,

Thats a really long one ya got there...

RandyMac

Ha ha, "medium" LOL....most of the time I ran 60" on my Macs. That porky, underpowered, overpriced 075 was a saw that the local dealer talked me into trying, I give it a good trial and gave it back. I will say that it was a very civilized chainsaw, quieter, lots less vibes, easy to start, didn't live up to the dealer's hype, which wasn't it's fault.

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RandyMac

Therrin

Wow, wish my shop would let me "try" saws.


While I was workin today I kept noticing the also-huge pine hanging over me full of dead wood. Though just how ironic it would be to be killed by a falling something while workin on one that's already on the ground.

newguy18

Speaking of videos,did you see this thread?
Hey Randy Mac,

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old schooler

Therrin

Yup, sure have.

I wonder if Unregistered has seen it though?

newguy18

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TreeDimensional

Umm, I saw it, Why would you ask?

newguy18

I was asking randy if he saw it.Hows the snow?

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TreeDimensional

The snow is cold, white and bright. Just what I needed at the end of April! If it would of held off for another week, we could have made a fortune repairing tree damage caused by linb breakage. On second thought, I would rather prune trees that haven't been weather compromised.

Eric Frei

Yeah I have seen it, posted a message and all.

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s.kerrone

Good video of the Redwoods comming down!!,to bad they couldn t grow that big in 50-60 years.(could fall the big boys all the time:thumbs)
Sad to here about another death,we just lost another faller on thursday (april 17) in our valley,we all know each other here so its tough!!! He was on a heli blk.,very steep ground with blow down,he bucked a root off and it slid down on top of him!

RandyMac

Dang, sorry to hear that, blowdowns can be bad, bucking the rootwad off is the worst part, they almost always rear up.

Yep, I have seen that video and exchanged messages with the poster. His uncle was running the cat, his father took the film, his cousin was the gal on the stump.
Other than the equipment being newer, that video showed what Redwood logging was from the fifties into the late 70s.

I have some logging footage, actually lots of it, old super 8, seems like a couple miles of it, some day I'll get it converted to dvd. It's mostly late 60s, blade to the ground, high ballin', rippin' and tearin' type stuff, it would probably offend you-all

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RandyMac

newguy18

It wouldn't offend me at all,i'm fascinated with redwood logging.

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old schooler

RandyMac

Hey NG, I left a link to a vid on the thread you started in the vidoe section, but I'll drop it in here.

they should have named it "Falling Rotten Old Eyesore"

To be honest, I found Redwood logging to be slow and tedious, but I was still a pup. I liked mixed stands, old growth Doug Firs and big hardwoods better.

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RandyMac

penfold

hey NG. i have seen that video but it was on another arb website, ???????, where I have seen a_lopa signing in, small world the web!!
penfold

newguy18

Second vid in my sig is redwood logging.

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old schooler