Brmorgan
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This actually happened 2 weeks ago in town here but I never thought to post it until now. My cousin works for the ambulance service here in town, and had to go out on this call.
A guy had a fairly big tree that had blown down on his property. We had pretty bad windstorms 3 weeks ago, but I don't know if they brought it down or it had been down awhile. When the tree blew over it brought up the entire root system as well, creating a foxhole of sorts where they used to be. This makes me suspect that it was a large spruce as they generally have shallow root systems around here (they only grow naturally in very damp areas such as ravines and swamps), and frequently blow down in this fashion. He limbed it, and then started bucking it into firewood. After he had cut a bunch, it eventually got to the point where the weight of the log was no longer enough to overcome the tension of the remaining roots that had not broken off. This caused the log to quickly spring upwards, effectively putting the roots back where they used to be, and the remainder of the tree vertical once more. This is dangerous enough in itself and could easily cause severe injury to the saw operator. As far as I know he escaped unharmed, EXCEPT....
His 10-year-old son was playing around the root system in the hole they had created, and when the tree popped back up he was crushed underneath. By the time the paramedics got him out from under there he had been trapped for almost two hours. My cousin managed to bring his heartbeat back, but unfortunately he had been without oxygen for far too long and the hospital was unable to save him. I don't know if he had also suffered traumatic injuries from the tree pinning him that alone could have been fatal. I suspect if it was heavy enough that he was either knocked unconscious or unable to breathe, it could have done major physical damage too - broken bones, crushed organs, etc.
At any rate it's just awful. I can't imagine what's going through the father's mind. If he had simply cut it off at the stump end first, most likely everything would be okay. Not that I'm blaming him - I've cut many trees like this, and also tend to start from the top down just because it's more convenient to let the stump keep the log nice and clear off the ground. Never had one whip up on me yet, but then again I'm usually dealing with trees that have been down for years. This might affect my habits though.
It hit my cousin really hard, because he has a 10-year-old that he's nearly lost a couple times because of a bad heart. And he's coming up on having to have another open heart surgery to replace a valve once he hits puberty. It was so sad last week to see the obituary for the boy in the newspaper. It didn't say anything about how he died, and most people won't know.
A guy had a fairly big tree that had blown down on his property. We had pretty bad windstorms 3 weeks ago, but I don't know if they brought it down or it had been down awhile. When the tree blew over it brought up the entire root system as well, creating a foxhole of sorts where they used to be. This makes me suspect that it was a large spruce as they generally have shallow root systems around here (they only grow naturally in very damp areas such as ravines and swamps), and frequently blow down in this fashion. He limbed it, and then started bucking it into firewood. After he had cut a bunch, it eventually got to the point where the weight of the log was no longer enough to overcome the tension of the remaining roots that had not broken off. This caused the log to quickly spring upwards, effectively putting the roots back where they used to be, and the remainder of the tree vertical once more. This is dangerous enough in itself and could easily cause severe injury to the saw operator. As far as I know he escaped unharmed, EXCEPT....
His 10-year-old son was playing around the root system in the hole they had created, and when the tree popped back up he was crushed underneath. By the time the paramedics got him out from under there he had been trapped for almost two hours. My cousin managed to bring his heartbeat back, but unfortunately he had been without oxygen for far too long and the hospital was unable to save him. I don't know if he had also suffered traumatic injuries from the tree pinning him that alone could have been fatal. I suspect if it was heavy enough that he was either knocked unconscious or unable to breathe, it could have done major physical damage too - broken bones, crushed organs, etc.
At any rate it's just awful. I can't imagine what's going through the father's mind. If he had simply cut it off at the stump end first, most likely everything would be okay. Not that I'm blaming him - I've cut many trees like this, and also tend to start from the top down just because it's more convenient to let the stump keep the log nice and clear off the ground. Never had one whip up on me yet, but then again I'm usually dealing with trees that have been down for years. This might affect my habits though.
It hit my cousin really hard, because he has a 10-year-old that he's nearly lost a couple times because of a bad heart. And he's coming up on having to have another open heart surgery to replace a valve once he hits puberty. It was so sad last week to see the obituary for the boy in the newspaper. It didn't say anything about how he died, and most people won't know.
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