Earl's account of the windstorm of April 2007
On Friday, April 27, there was thunder at Smokey Lake Drive at around 3:30 in the afternoon. The radar picture at www.weather.gov showed this line of storms. We're at the top of the largest red section
There's a soybean field in back of my house, and there the wind started to get very loud. It was a hiss-roar unlike any I've ever quite heard.
It lasted only a minute or so, but when it was over, a Tulip Poplar, about 60 feet in height, had fallen over onto the next house over.
These houses have truss roofs, which means the ceiling and roof are connected at many places. So if something crashes into the roof...
It takes the ceiling with it.
The kitchen is at the side of the house, where the tree fell, and suffered this.
As did this bedroom.
Fiberglass insulation from the attic had fallen over everything. You can see some of the tree through the hole in the roof.
It was quite a neighborhood event, and many gathered to check it out.
The tree had split about four feet from the ground. There was a lot of rot inside the trunk, though no visible signs on the outside. The diameter of the trunk was in excess of 24 inches.
A news helicopter circled nearby, passing directly overhead.
They'd discovered these bleachers at Bishop Sullivan Catholic High School, on the other side of the soybean field a few hundred feet away. In the newscast at 11:00 that night, they'd report that both the home and away bleachers had been tossed over the backstop, and landed at the pitcher's mound.Somehow, they didn't notice nearby our 60-foot tree laying on its side and having crashed through a roof. But we think local TV news isn't really much more news than TV wrestling is really wrestling.
The next morning, Sun Valley Tree Experts showed up with all kinds of people and equipment, including this hired crane from E.T. Gresham Company.
The crane, with operator, costs $180/hour on a Saturday (it would have been $144/hour on a weekday).
As workers on the roof cut the tree up, the crane brought the large sections to the street, where it was further cut up.
This chipper can handle pieces up to 18 inches in diameter. It costs $50,000.
The truck got completely filled with wood chips before this project was over (which included two smaller trees we didn't photograph, and a Gum tree you'll see later). The chips were taken to SPSA (Southeastern Public Service Authority), a Chesapeake plant that handles recyclable waste. It's made into mulch.
The large sections were trucked to someone who takes them to a mill. You might have a pencil or wooden chair some day from this.The street was blocked off more than half of the day with all of Sun Valley's equipment and the crane.
The Sun Valley people handled the project efficiently. Everyone seemed to know what to do, and there were no incidents.
This crane operator had bits of idle time while they worked, and he's likely making more money than anyone here. They have to know what they're doing -- it's a lot of responsibility. He was able to very precisely and smoothly move the large tree sections and place them right where they were wanted.
The people in the next house down contracted the Sun Valley tree folks on the spot to remove a large gum tree in their front yard. We wonder why!!!. As the crane held it, it was sawn in two, about 15 feet from the ground, ...
...then the crane hauled the top of it, which was most of it, to the street, where it met the same fate as the first tree.
We don't know if this was just a freak burst of high wind, or a small tornado. We didn't hear of any similar incidents in this area. There was a confirmed tornado in Gloucester, many miles away on the same afternoon.
Another house nearby got these two trees blown onto it, but the damage appears minimal.
