# Hurricane Gudrun, Sweden.



## Mange (May 23, 2005)

I thought you might want to see some pics, of what is out off the woods so far. This is just for one mill and about half of the total timber. The´se is now about 2 years worth, in these pics.

The piles are 4m high and about 300m long, most is in 4m length.


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## Mange (May 23, 2005)

This is oly one off all the places they store on, I know of 4 more and this is the smallest.


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## JamesTX (May 23, 2005)

In picture 364, are they spraying the log with water? I've heard of chips sponateously combusting, but not whole logs.

That's a lot of wood.

James


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## Mange (May 23, 2005)

That is to prevent cracking, The logs literally dry from inside out.


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## SWE#Kipp (May 23, 2005)

Nice pictures


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## MasterBlaster (May 23, 2005)

Man, that's a lotta wood.


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## Mange (May 23, 2005)

I would guess there is about 35 000 cubic meters so far here.

Makes me think of the frase: Got wood


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## redprospector (May 23, 2005)

I hate to see the hurricane did that much damage, but at least you guys can 
salvage what you can.
Here in the U.S. the environmentalist would put a court injunction on any salvage operations because those trees could be homes for bugs or something.
Andy

Environmentalist have redwood decks!


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## jason j ladue (May 24, 2005)

nice pics mange...


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## Old Monkey (May 24, 2005)

I remember seeing saw mills like that as a kid in Northern Cal. Now they're all gone. I have mixed feelings about that. We swing violently one direction then another over here in the U.S. Over log the forests beyond there ability to recover and then stop logging altogether. Soon we'll be in a pillaging cycle again. Nice picts Mange.


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## belgian (May 24, 2005)

Hello Mange,

not surprised to see your pictures. I witnessed myself the damage caused by Gudrun, during a business trip earlier this year, and it really was impressive.
Hope the Swede wood business will live through this.


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## Mange (May 24, 2005)

This will be tuff. 5 years wood down in a few hours, this is to be taken out of the woods before insects get too it or sun/heat cracks it, not easy.
Looking at a wider prospect, if we pull this off and get the timber out safe, what do we cut down the next 5 years?


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## ray benson (May 24, 2005)

One article said more than 25 million trees uprooted in one night.


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## Tree Machine (May 26, 2005)

Holy moly !


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## Tree Machine (May 26, 2005)

When was this?


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## ray benson (May 26, 2005)

January 8, 2005 The most violent storm to strike Sweden since 1969 swept across the southern half of the country, killing seven people and leaving 359,000 households without electricity. The Barsebäck nuclear power plant was forced to shut down its remaining reactor since there were not enough functioning power lines to transmit the electricity it was generating. With gusts of over 150km/h, the hurricane, which Norwegian meteorologists named "Gudrun", caused chaos as railways and bridges were closed, aircraft were grounded and ferries were kept in ports.


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## Mange (May 26, 2005)

South Sweden was shut down for almost 2 weeks. I know some that waited up to 8 weeks to get power.
This is wurse than 1969, without a doubt.
There are powerkables laying on the ground, with uo to 10000v in them.
If all goes a planed it will they dug down. 

All I know in the tree industry suffered some lost, or will. 
Another logger got hurt yesterday.

When I had lunch yesterday, I sat next to 3 guy's from Timberjack in Germany.


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## Tree Machine (May 26, 2005)

Oh my goodness ! You guys were hardly a blip in the news because of the Tsunami coverage. You guys got a _January Hurricane_. What a freaking freak of a freak.

Can we have more pictures??? Pleease?


Hey, do you need the Tree Machine come over and help out?


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## MasterBlaster (May 26, 2005)

Or maybe Solo Cat?


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## Tree Machine (May 26, 2005)

SHHHHHHhhhhh!


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## Mange (May 26, 2005)

Tree Machine said:


> Oh my goodness ! You guys were hardly a blip in the news because of the Tsunami coverage. You guys got a _January Hurricane_. What a freaking freak of a freak.
> 
> Can we have more pictures??? Pleease?
> 
> ...



What you want pics of, I have some video from Jönköping. I can cut out some pics of that.

I think you would be more than welcome. Here is Loggers from most of Europe, I think you might like going in front of the Harvester cutting free tree's from the roots.

I have Video of a tree that was standing beside the road, that was torn up and lifted over the road and dropped on top of a pile of tree's that I estimate to be about 8 meters high. I have video of a 6 meter wide root laying on it's side, 0,5 meter above ground.
I would really like to see how long the guy's like 056 walk around in this, an hour? a day? kickbacks in these situations is unavoidable!!
experienced loggers with 25 years in the trade is in hospital a count of injury's from this work.
One fallen tree is one thing but when you have 8 more on top of each other like a fallen card house, it is a bit different. cut in one and the tension from the other 7 stir up you brain.

I admire these MEN!


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## Thor's Hammer (May 26, 2005)

Funny thing Mange, but Uk loggers are taking Excavator based harvesters over there. No one in sweden runs excavator conversions any more (all purpose built machines) but the excavator harvesters have the slew and lift power to drag the tangled trees out stump included to harvest them


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## Mange (May 26, 2005)

This is not true, there is a few, but not many.
Last year on Elmia Forrest show it was sold 2 as far as I know. I asked the seller. We was there on the Friday, so perhaps there was sold more on the weekend.


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## Mange (Aug 20, 2005)

Half the wood is done now, for sure. Some say there is 40% left in the woods, I find that more resoneble.
They predict all to be finiched in Mars.

A big problem that has been is intruct the drivers where to get what and where to take it.
I guess if you do not speak more than Eng and Swedish you are on thin ice at a job like that.
Many loggers have been sent home due to bad pp. This is good.
I know there is a 3 week break but I think it is over by now.
on the really hot day's the harvesters stop as well as the loggers.
1/3 of the timber cut to milling wood will actually be milled. The rest to paper industry.


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## Tree Machine (Aug 20, 2005)

Hello Mange. The thought of that weather event doing what it did to your forests just blows my mind. I don't think most people understand the extent of how much an area of Forests it FLATTENED.

I am so very thrilled that you guys are managing the disaster as a harvest. Pulling stumps means the earth is prepped for replantation, which I'm sure you'll manage for your country's future. So smart.

Here in the US, the same event might be given 'protected status' and the crop would be required by law to rot into the ground. Mebbe not, though. Politics is not always 'for the better good'. I respect your efforts and wish there was some way I could help.


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## Mange (Aug 20, 2005)

I think we have experiances of the 60's hurricane in mind, the affects of that was much harder, since harvesters and mills was not able to prossess as fast as today.

What is left now is under a lot of pressour from mother nature. She want the bugs to feast on what is left.

Here we have a few plants to do, there is plants ordered from Europe Russia Finland and the baltic's.

I do not get much facts sent to me, but I have friends in the industry, they talk a bunch and the facts of that I try to find.

The affects of this is severe. The mill here not far from me has 2-3 years wood cut up and waiting already, they counted on a 5 year pile to work with, and that the mill was to run 165-180% of what it did before.

A lot of this timber is already too bad to mill.

This means that the timber milled during the next few years will be bad to say the least and there will be at least 50% waste that can not be replaced.

I do not think many outside the tree industry understand the full affect of this, here or elsewere.


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## Tree Machine (Aug 20, 2005)

Mange, this just makes my jaw drop open.

I can imagine that a lot of the regrowth from the 1960 hurricane is what is on the ground right now. 46 years of growth and all you have to do is go out and get it.

If you DON"T get it out, I can see it being a fire hazard for drought periods for the next several years, then the decaying logs will be there for Foresters to trip over and be in the way of transport and replant efforts  .

It's a race against time. Sweden vs. fungus and weather.

What are you lacking in to speed up the race to your advantage. Is the bottleneck manpower, mills or money?

It just hurts to think that so much of that wood will go to waste. What species of trees, primarily?


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## JJackson (Aug 20, 2005)

Thanks for sharing the picutres with us Mange. Looks like the mills will be very busy trying to get wood or pulp from all those logs before they go bad. IS it mostly spruce?


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## Mange (Aug 21, 2005)

JJackson said:


> IS it mostly spruce?



Yes. Almost all of it.
I do not understand why they still plant this here. The climate is wrong here.
There is rekommendations to plant 20% Leaf trees.
I think it is as fast as possible, perhaps a few more trucks would help, there is a lot in the woods yet.

If there is too many trucks the logistics will have problems, Roads etc. is fully used as is.


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## Mange (Oct 20, 2005)

Here is a pic of one of the sites that there is timber on.

This place is 1,5% of the total wood fallen.

There is 12 of these, 2300 meters long and 13 meters high.


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## Mange (Oct 21, 2005)

These are from Byholma, Ljungby.


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## Mange (Oct 21, 2005)




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## Mange (Oct 21, 2005)




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## belgian (Oct 21, 2005)

*wow !*

where's all that wood going ...


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## Mange (Oct 21, 2005)

The stored wood is to be milled in the future, in about a year they will start to take wood from here.
Keep in mind this is only 1,5% of the total wood fallen.
Most of it will be toilet paper


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## Tree Machine (Oct 21, 2005)

Wow, thank you Mange, for that juicy set of pictures. All those mountains of wood and 98% of it is still out in the forests. Goodness!

I find it very encouraging that the plan for reclamation seems well-organized and ongoing. I applaud the efforts of all the people involved. It's a humongous job.


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## Mange (Oct 21, 2005)

There is 1,5% at this place alone.
I have not the latest figures on how much is out of woods, but I think about 60%.
There is a lot of private mills that has their own storage places.
There is 6 of these big sites, and much has gone to Litauen and Estonia by boat.
I was down in the harbor to see them load, but I missed it by a hour, I will try to be there and take a few pics, it is pretty impressive to see.


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## spacemule (Oct 21, 2005)

I just wonder how difficult it would be to keep the stack from leaning when you get that high.


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## 046 (Nov 2, 2005)

WOW... what a lot of wood


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## woodsrider (Nov 3, 2005)

Truly awesome pics, Mange. Thanks for posting!


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## Bodean (Nov 4, 2005)

Those are completely unfathomable pictures. 
I wonder if swedish furniture will drop in price here at IKEA.
I need a desk.


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## Mange (Apr 12, 2006)

According to the most I have talked to about 90% is cut up and out of the forrests. Some will never get out but that is about 0,5% or something.

It is about 75 millon cubic meters of wood that is gone.


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## DDM (Apr 14, 2006)

Those are the cleanest storage yards ive ever seen.No 2' deep ruts no bark strone all over.


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## sawn_penn (Apr 14, 2006)

Better blown over than burnt. We had a >1M hectare fire (~4000 sq mi) down here in 2003.

Obviously it wasn't all plantation, but an incalculable amout of timber went up in smoke that week.


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## the swede (May 29, 2006)

Well,i was there for 11 months! cutting loose the trees for the harvesters! it´s not a pretty sight! but at least i´m still alive  some other loggers where not as lucky as me!


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## wradman (May 30, 2006)

*wood supply*

to bad they couldn't store that wood in a lake it would last longer


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## pyro_forester (Jun 22, 2006)

Wow, that really is a lot of wood!
Somebody asked about the sprayers on top of the piles. We learned about this in our harvesting class. It _is_ to keep the wood from drying out, but what's really cool, is that the logs get a gray "slime" (that's the technical term) on them that preserves them from cracking and insects too. This has been your resident college guy  

Taylor


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## 1CallLandscape (Jun 22, 2006)

wow, thats an insane amout of wood!! anybody up for a splitting party...i'll brind the dogs and beer
-mike


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