Storm Damage
At some point I am going to add more to this page about the various storms we've weathered here (like hurricane Fran in '96), but for now the only thing I'm going to cover is the trees that the lightning hit in 2006 and the after effects.
So before we bought the house from my parents I would come over to the house every few weeks while they were in the mountains building their new house and check on the house for them. One day (May 14, 2006) when I did that I discovered a little surprise. Evidently, lightning had struck at least 3 trees right at the northwest corner of the house. The biggest tree (a huge black oak) took the brunt of it. It was amazing to see the effects - it looks like the tree exploded from the inside out. There were splinters of bark and wood all over the yard, even on the opposite side of the house! The pictures don\'t do it justice. The other two trees were a fairly good size maple and an average size hornbeam.
The Black Oak
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The big black oak was killed instantly (I'm thinking he had a pretty direct hit and experienced no suffering). The tree was very large and very close to the house so my parents had that tree taken down for us right before we bought the house. <-- Click to see more pictures of the Oak tree - 18 pictures |
The Hornbeam
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The hornbeam also felt no pain and met a quick demise. It was small enough that when it fell a year or so later it did not hit anything, just fell in the woods. <-- Click to see a larger picture of the Hornbeam - 1 picture |
The Maple
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Maples, however, are tough trees. Despite the bark being split (you can see it in the pictures) the tree continued to live, seemingly unscathed. (enter creepy forshadowing music here)... <-- Click to see more pictures of the Maple tree - 4 pictures |
The Yard
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Here are some pictures of the yard, in the front and the back yard behind the house! Splinters of wood everywhere. <-- Click to see more pictures of the Yard - 11 pictures |
The Maple Strikes Back
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A little over 4 years later (July 20, 2010) the maple had evidently developed a weak spot. To the naked eye, the maple seemed to still be in good shape. However, just 15 minutes after I left my office at the end of a typical work day, during an average summer storm, the top portion of the maple fell out and landed on the house, poking some holes in the roof above my office. Fortunately, the tree service was able to get the tree off the house for us the very next morning and a very nice roof repair company fixed our roof the next afternoon (before it rained again). <-- Click to see the pictures of the tree on the house - 38 pictures |