Windstorm

Today we spent some time at the home of my mother. In the neighboring yard, near the common fence, is a poplar tree. I'm sure it started as a small tree, but for the last 25 years, we have watched it grow and commented on how dangerous it was to have such a tree near 3 houses on city lots. The neighbors love the trees on their property and are loath to remove them.

Yesterday and the day before, the local weather forecasters all started to speak of high winds. It must have been like the perfect conditions for a wind storm with the county where Mom lives at the center of the storm. Yesterday while the wind was blowing, most folks sort of hunkered down and waited to see what was happening, watching from the windows as shingles, rocks, trees, siding, fences and other things flew past. Mom said a couple of her fence panels were gone as well as the fence across the street. Another neighbor had a fir tree leaning on her house.

Then there was a big thud. When Mom called to tell me the poplar tree had fallen, my first response was, "Which house did it hit?" I was surprised when she told me it had miraculously fallen in about the only place where no house was hit....Mom's garden. Although the roots of the tree are in the neighbor's yard, the majority of the 90 foot tall tree is in Mom's yard...where I think it will stay for a while until they decide what to do about it.

That tree is so big, I was not able to take a picture of the entire thing in one photo. Here you can see the roots in the neighbor's yard.





As you see, it was able to fall into Mom's yard by simply crushing two panels of the fence, along with Mom's favorite peach tree. Here is the other end of the tree. I goes almost the entire length of the yard. You can also see where the wind blew out two panels of the back fence.



It is a poplar...a tall, rather skinny tree. I had no idea how wide it really was! This is the middle part of the tree.



Next is a view looking east toward the roots of the tree. You can also see one of the missing fence panels.



This tree is just the most noticeable of several problems in the yard. The concrete retaining wall that holds the wooden fence also has some new issues. Before the fence post broke off and the panels actually fell, the fence wiggled enough to cause some good-sized cracks in the concrete.







Every fence post has cracked the concrete.

This picture is the next concern. The neighbor has yet another tree just over the fence. It is an old willow that has a number of limbs in poor shape. Whenever the wind blows, branches of the tree litter Mom's lawn.





We can't help wondering if this will be the next tree to fall...right onto the shed or house.

This morning we took a ride around the neighborhood. Almost every coniferous tree of any size in the neighborhood is down. Many homes are missing shingles. Some are missing siding. We saw a car with broken windows from rocks blowing into them. Many deciduous trees are also down. A small city further to the south estimated that they lost 1000 trees in the storm. Some homes were damaged by falling trees. I don't believe I saw a single fence without pieces missing. They said the storm was the equivalent of a category 2 hurricane. There were wind gusts over 100 mph.

I was impressed with what I saw in the neighborhood today though. Streets and yards were full of folks, helping one another. It was amazing how much cleaning up was done today...not by paid workers, but just by neighbors helping neighbors.