DIGGER27
In Memory Of
I live in a neighborhood where the homes were built in the 1920's, as such we have some massive 90 year old plus trees all over the place.
Many in the small curbs strips that have ripped up the sidewalks with their roots and have recently decided they don't want to keep holding up some of their big branches anymore.
Across the street from me was one with 5 huge such branches and in the last few months three have broken off and fallen and hit two cars and two houses.
Finally someone called the city and made them cut down the last two because they were the biggest ones and would have destroyed any part of any home they would hit...and they were aiming in way to do just that.
We got a big old tree like this in our backyard too, it started in my neighbor's yard but got so big the trunk spread over to my side...the thing has to be at least 100 foot tall if not more.
One branch fell on my house a couple of years ago and that branch had to be at least 2 feet in diameter, instead of crashing through our house the kudzu surrounding it evidently lowered it slowly enough to where it just rested on our roof with very little damage.
I used to hate kudzu but now it is my favorite plant.
It cost $800 for the tree guys to come out and remove this one branch and get it off our house.
Last night about 7 pm I heard a crash and our power went out and I knew what happened.
Another big branch broke off this tree and came down in my backyard taking my service drop from the power pole and my cable line with it.
Also took out another tree in the middle of my yard and it was long enough that the end of the branch hit one of the main lines running through all the backyards along the property lines and shut the power off of the house next door and the two behind me too.
At 3:30 in the morning the power guys finally got out to us and got the power going again.
All the commotion around here woke me up so I stayed up.
Not 20 minutes after the power guys left I was sitting on my porch drinking a cup of coffee when I heard another breaking sound I have become all to familiar with lately.
My power stayed on this time, so did my neighbor's but I knew something had happened so even in the dark I walked around to my backyard hoping my home was still intact and also hoping another huge chunk of wood was not sitting in my yard.
It wasn't but my neighbor was not so lucky because the thing came down completely right on top of his house.
That tree was gone, this huge thing that blocked off the sun from my yard that soared so high into the sky was now resting comfortably at a different angle right on his roof.
Damage to his home for sure plus it hit the electric meter which is on the back of our homes and exposed wires so the power company had to come out and shut his power off again and won't repair the thing until they get rid of this tree.
I ran an extension cord to his house from mine so he could keep his WiFi going and his fridge working because coolers and ice is such hassle.
In turn he is letting my wife piggyback on his WiFi because she works from home and our cable company has not seen fit to come out and hook us back up as yet.
Now the tree company is out here to the care of this mess as I write this.
They have a huge 150 foot crane they are setting up in my neighbor's driveway but I talked to the owner and he said he is a little worried because this tree is massive and he thinks it is just about at the limit of what this crane can handle.
I sure hope all goes well...I don't need several thousand more pounds of wood dropped on my poor little home.
Now the owner tells me the ground is too soft to use the crane, the wood under the stabilizers are buckling and the ground is sinking too far down under two of them and that is before they will be putting up to almost 100,000 pounds of pressure on them so they have to do it the hard way and cut the trunk into smaller pieces and get it out that way...Fine with me.
He says if that crane isn't set up perfect and on very solid ground if it turns over it would cut one of our homes completely in half so better safe than sorry...smart guy.
My neighbor got a price on removing this tree for between $6-$9,000 but he couldn't narrow it down until they were through and stuff like this is why.
Here are some pics of my backyard...
Here is what's left of the tree and what it looks like in his backyard.....
Here is a pic of the ceiling in one room in the back of his house where the tree fell....
Nothing you really want to see when you own a home.
Insurance will take care of it, he is expecting to get some improvements on part of his house and a new roof at least by the time it is all over.
The one good thing is neither of us have to worry about this tree anymore.
Many in the small curbs strips that have ripped up the sidewalks with their roots and have recently decided they don't want to keep holding up some of their big branches anymore.
Across the street from me was one with 5 huge such branches and in the last few months three have broken off and fallen and hit two cars and two houses.
Finally someone called the city and made them cut down the last two because they were the biggest ones and would have destroyed any part of any home they would hit...and they were aiming in way to do just that.
We got a big old tree like this in our backyard too, it started in my neighbor's yard but got so big the trunk spread over to my side...the thing has to be at least 100 foot tall if not more.
One branch fell on my house a couple of years ago and that branch had to be at least 2 feet in diameter, instead of crashing through our house the kudzu surrounding it evidently lowered it slowly enough to where it just rested on our roof with very little damage.
I used to hate kudzu but now it is my favorite plant.
It cost $800 for the tree guys to come out and remove this one branch and get it off our house.
Last night about 7 pm I heard a crash and our power went out and I knew what happened.
Another big branch broke off this tree and came down in my backyard taking my service drop from the power pole and my cable line with it.
Also took out another tree in the middle of my yard and it was long enough that the end of the branch hit one of the main lines running through all the backyards along the property lines and shut the power off of the house next door and the two behind me too.
At 3:30 in the morning the power guys finally got out to us and got the power going again.
All the commotion around here woke me up so I stayed up.
Not 20 minutes after the power guys left I was sitting on my porch drinking a cup of coffee when I heard another breaking sound I have become all to familiar with lately.
My power stayed on this time, so did my neighbor's but I knew something had happened so even in the dark I walked around to my backyard hoping my home was still intact and also hoping another huge chunk of wood was not sitting in my yard.
It wasn't but my neighbor was not so lucky because the thing came down completely right on top of his house.
That tree was gone, this huge thing that blocked off the sun from my yard that soared so high into the sky was now resting comfortably at a different angle right on his roof.
Damage to his home for sure plus it hit the electric meter which is on the back of our homes and exposed wires so the power company had to come out and shut his power off again and won't repair the thing until they get rid of this tree.
I ran an extension cord to his house from mine so he could keep his WiFi going and his fridge working because coolers and ice is such hassle.
In turn he is letting my wife piggyback on his WiFi because she works from home and our cable company has not seen fit to come out and hook us back up as yet.
Now the tree company is out here to the care of this mess as I write this.
They have a huge 150 foot crane they are setting up in my neighbor's driveway but I talked to the owner and he said he is a little worried because this tree is massive and he thinks it is just about at the limit of what this crane can handle.
I sure hope all goes well...I don't need several thousand more pounds of wood dropped on my poor little home.
Now the owner tells me the ground is too soft to use the crane, the wood under the stabilizers are buckling and the ground is sinking too far down under two of them and that is before they will be putting up to almost 100,000 pounds of pressure on them so they have to do it the hard way and cut the trunk into smaller pieces and get it out that way...Fine with me.
He says if that crane isn't set up perfect and on very solid ground if it turns over it would cut one of our homes completely in half so better safe than sorry...smart guy.
My neighbor got a price on removing this tree for between $6-$9,000 but he couldn't narrow it down until they were through and stuff like this is why.
Here are some pics of my backyard...
Here is what's left of the tree and what it looks like in his backyard.....
Here is a pic of the ceiling in one room in the back of his house where the tree fell....
Nothing you really want to see when you own a home.
Insurance will take care of it, he is expecting to get some improvements on part of his house and a new roof at least by the time it is all over.
The one good thing is neither of us have to worry about this tree anymore.
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.....later on I cut down several other large trees further away from the house as I want more open area.
