Friday, June 1, 2012

Our Windfall...

Today's the first day of Hurricane Season.
We've already had some strange weather
a week before the season officially begins.
This is a long story...



See these two tall trees in our neighbor's backyard?
She had one more just like it out front.
The folks across the street from her were having a party
and a company was putting up an inflatable slide
(like a bounce house, only it was a slide).
I saw them from the backyard when I went out
to take pictures of the garden.
It looked like rain, so I wanted to get some shots before it hit.
A few minutes after I came inside,
there was a tremendous gust of wind for a few minutes.

Turns out the slide had not been fully secured and the gust
took not only the slide up, but the guy holding it.
He was airborn and finally let go of the thing.
He ended up with a broken ankle after landing on the street.
My neighbor lost her mailbox and the giant tree out front.
The slide continued on for four blocks
after destroying her property,
damaging fences along the way.
That was some wind...

The tree was taken down and cut up. 
It will not be replaced,
and the two in the backyard will be removed as well.
This neighbor offered to give us the mulch
that used to sit under her trees.
Generous soul, she is.




We had planned on purchasing more pine bark
to fill in the path along the east side of the house.
Just hadn't gotten around to it.




Although I feel awful for the guys and the expense of repairing the damage done by their equipment,
and knowing the tree wouldn't make it
and now the other two will be cut down as well,
I'm mighty grateful that it didn't turn out worse.
And that we'll have a piece of that tree right here.

Stay safe out there
and get those supplies stocked up!
It's gonna be a long season...



7 comments:

  1. What a freak accident! I bet the insurance company never heard a tale like THAT one-LOL! Glad everyone was okay, but wow.......

    ReplyDelete
  2. Holey Moley! Just like a big ballon lifting you up. He's lucky all he got away with was a broken ankle! Me? I'd probably still be hanging onto the thing.

    Good luck with the hurricane season this year. As strange as it's been this year you can't be too prepared.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Life works out in strange ways sometime. I can not believe that guy did not let go of the inflatable way before he got up in the air! That is crazy. Glad he is ok, he could have hit a power line.

    ReplyDelete
  4. well that was quite a wind! we get some strong winds here, usually straight line as we are out of hurricane threat way up in ND, I have however been in two hurricanes myself on the Gulf coast. Stay safe and yep...get those supplies stocked!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Sue-I'll bet you're right about that!

    tami-Thanks for the well wishes.

    Jane-Yeah, he was fortunate it wasn't worse. No power lines in our neighborhood.

    shannon-We are stocked!

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh wow, I am glad to hear the guy suffered only minor injuries. That would be so frightening!

    ReplyDelete
  7. Prairie Cat-Yeah, I'm glad it turned out okay.

    ReplyDelete

Thanks for taking the time to leave your thoughts!