Death by Falling Tree

Kevin Hillery, a family friend, was mountain biking during an adventure race in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley under stormy conditions when a tree fell. The tree hit Hillery on the head, rolled down his back and landed on his bike’s back tire. It broke Hillery’s back, severed his spinal cord and sent him flying over the handlebars. At the time of the accident, he was a student at the United States Naval Academy and was traveling with three other students. I was reminded of this incident today when reading the Adirondack Almanack which featured a story discussing Dan Crane’s, an ecologist and frequent Adirondack hiker, fears of being crushed by a tree.

At a first glance Crane’s fears seem irrational, but when he provides context one can sympathize with him.  "He details a time when a tree fell just a few feet in front of him when he was riding his ATV. He also had experience camping on July 15, 1995 in the Five Ponds Wilderness Area when a storm rolled in and decimates hundreds of trees near his campsite. Crane went on to detail how his experiences have lead to a full blown anxiety disorder regarding the prospect of being crushed by a tree. He discusses how checking the weather report has become as important to his travels as mapping out the route and packing the correct gear. One of his main methods is surveying the canopy for dead trees and situating his camp accordingly. He emphasizes that he never knocks down a dead tree because it violates the no trace values, since dead trees function as a habitat for a variety of forest inhabitants" (Crane 1).  Now having read anecdotal evidence and experienced personal reasons for a fear of falling trees, I was interested in the data on deaths related to falling trees.

"A study conducted between 1995 and 2007 showed 407 deaths from wind-related tree failures in the United States.  This breaks down to about 34 tree related deaths each year in the United States alone. To put this in perspective, shark attacks killed 3 people worldwide last year and 92 people are killed each day in motor vehicle accidents" (Schmidlin 2). My takeaway from the data, personal experience and anecdotes is that it is important to be aware of falling trees, especially in thunderstorms.  It makes sense to know the signs of a vulnerable tree and to pick a campsite accordingly, but it also is somewhat irrational to let that be a main concern during your trip. It is pretty unlikely despite Crane’s best arguments that you will killed by a falling tree.

Works Cited

Crane, Dan. "Backcountry Fears: Being Crushed By A Tree -." The Adirondack Almanack.     

Adirondack Explorer, 31 Mar. 2015. Web. 06 Apr. 2015.

Schmidlin, Thomas W. "Human Fatalities from Wind-related Tree Failures in the United States,

1995–2007." Natural Hazards 50.1 (2009): 13-25. Springer Science and Business, 18

Nov. 2008. Web. 6 Apr. 2015.