I had a limb fall in a windstorm a few weeks back. It hit my tarp. Two feet to the left and I would have been pummeled. Now where am I gonna camp. I pick a nice flat spot, out of the wind, good drainage, blah, blah, blah and then I look up and there is a big dead limb. I think there is a conspiracy to have deadfalls over all the good sites. (I also have it on good authority that Humpty Dumpty did'nt fall, he was pushed). Off all the ways to go out this one would be pretty embarrasing. I have a Smokies guidebook that notes a place 200 yard off a trail where a mountain preacher was squooshed under a big slab of rock while he slept. This is over in the Cataloochee area as I recall. I think the slab was too big to be moved and the remains are still there.
Has anyone else had a close call with a limb or falling object?

I had to bypass a spot I'd planned to stay at (Crystal Prong) and walk another couple of miles dead-tired at the end of a long day hauling a lot of water because I couldn't find a safe place to camp with all the leaning and dead trees and limbs. The whole area had been damaged heavily by an ice storm a few years earlier and the forest is so dense that lots of dead stuff is hung up in living trees just waiting for a good breeze.

When I did finally find a place, I actually pulled over the first tree I tried to hang my food bag in! Fortunately, that was a hundred yards from the site and it fell slowly enough I could get out of the way. It's hard to find good trees to hang a food bag in the Ouachitas, but that was ridiculous.

As for close calls, I've heard big trees crack and crash to the ground very near my campsite after heavy rains in the middle of the following quiet deep in the night, hitting so hard that even in a hammock I could feel the ground shake. That'll wake you up and get the ol' heart pounding.

This wasn't a close call but one of the most tragic things I had ever seen.

We hiked in Kootenay National Park in August of 2003.

We started with a day-hike loop trip on Sinclair Creek and fell in with a solo hiker, a geologist with an Alberta oil company at the trailhead. Well into the hike he told us about a tragic accident during a "blowdown" in the park a month earlier.

A family had been hiking the Ink Pots trail and was returning to their car as a storm approached. The two girls in the family went ahead and found a picnic table -- one of those made of concrete -- and both sat down on the bench on one side.

When the wind came through it was a classic Canadian "blowdown," similar, but not as strong as the one we had seen the results of at Wells Gray Provincial Park in BC a few years earlier -- one that left some monstrous trees snapped liked twigs about 10 feet up.

The hiker told us a 60-foot spruce tree fell in Kootenay. Could have fallen anywhere, but snapped and fell on those two little girls waiting for their parents and killed both of them.

Later that week we unknowingly parked in the Ink Pots lot to do a two-night backpack up at Helmet Falls that begins at the Ink Pots trail. We had a great hike with the added excitement of having a close encounter with a young grizzly that fortunately let us be.

When we returned to the car and were leaving, I told my wife I needed to make a trek over to the bathroom before we departed. But the restroom was locked and I walked into the woods to find a secluded place to pee. And I stumbled upon a picnic table -- one bench and the table intact -- and a huge tree laying across the other crushed bench. It hit me like a brick; I was aghast. This was the place of that accident that the hiker had told us about. It looked as if little had been touched or moved, probably because of an ongoing investigation.

Standing there staring at that scene, knowing what had happened, I couldn't believe how terrible that must have been for those parents. We have no kids so I honestly cannot say how painful it must have been. I can only guess. I got back in the car and told my wife what I had just seen. I remember we didn't talk for a long time on the road back to Calgary.

This was the story from the CBC. I have a feeling phat or Noel will probably remember it.

Since then, I've always thought that if a branch ever fell from a tree and hit me on the head or broke my leg, I would try not to curse or to whimper, for it would be absolutely nothing -- nothing compared to what those parents have gone through by that tree happening to fall down at that moment on that day at that particular place.

Count our blessings.

I am going to take some anti depressants now.

An account of two people who had a large tree fall on their tent while they were sleeping, reminding us that it certainly can happen:
http://www.bwca.cc/diaries/closecall.htm

I've always heard large dead limbs called "widowmakers." I learned as a child (probably because my parents read about it somewhere) always to examine a potential campsite for overhanging dead limbs or nearby dead trees.

Right on, Mouse. That brings up another good question. That night I was in Joyce Kilmer in an area I had stayed at before. It had been dark for a couple of hours before I got to the site and there was a slight fog. I carry an LED headlamp- and my experience is that distance is limited in even the lightest fog with this type light. So how sould one choose a site - maybe I should have slept next to large boulder or a fallen tree so that I would have been somewhat protected. I must ponder this.

Actually your safest bet would be under a fallen tree to protect you.

I grew up fearing widowmakers more than bears, so i am extra careful before I pitch the hammock or a tarp, or even stop for a respite along a trail.

It's not just the dead limbs that can get you. Several years ago, I was playing golf with a neighbor when across the fairway a hugh oak split in two and half of it fell to the ground with a thunderous crash. It was a beautiful summer day, no wind 85 degrees. I guess the tree was old and heavy with leaves etc.

If a tree falls in the woods and no-one is there to see it, doe's it make a sound? <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" />

> If a tree falls in the woods and no-one is there to see it, doe's it make a sound?

The blind man says "yes."

It happened again last night. I bet I did not get 3 hours sleep last night and probably no more than 30 minutes in a row. I was in the Smokies and a storm blew through. There were two other campers just up the hill from me at campsite #15. At about 7 pm a wind started blowing-before long it sounded like a freight train up on the ridge - then whuuuurrrrr, here it comes down on us. A 3 foot, 4" diameter limb/log fell 50 feet out of the tree top and landed on end, digging into the ground 2 inches-- and it was about 6 feet from my tarp. Then about 20 minutes later some more fell from another tree about 15 feet away. Then a ball bat sozed one fell two feet away from my tarp on the other side of me. All this time I would hear the other two campers and see their light shining up in the trees. This morning I asked if they stayed dry and they said " yes, but we thought we gonna get crushed! ". Its getting dangerous out there.
There were 25 mile per hour winds predicted in Knoxville. I am not sure what speed the winds were in the mountains, but on the ridge and less protected areas it must have been awful. I laid in a ball with my arms over my head for a big part of the night. I weigh 200 pounds, but you could have fit me in a shoe box last night. I was trying to be a small target and cover the vitals. That scared the p-waddlin' out of me. The silent killer - whack. Or worse--scewered to the ground and still alive.
I gotta figure something out here. This is two close calls in a month. But if you saw the site you would think, like I did, that it all looks the same- you look up and see the same thing everywhere. Big tall trees. You would need the Hubble telescope to check the condition of the limbs overhead. I think from now on I am going to look for evergreen, spruce, hemlock type trees to stay under. At least their canopy would slow the missle down a bit.

HH:
Sounds like you were in that incredible wind storm that swept thru the central US the last few days. They had 60K gusts in the Dallas area, blew buildings down, lots of fires, roofs torn off. And heading east. Dryer's park might have felt it pretty good, too. So if you were a cat, HH, how many lives left?

3 by my estimate- not including the time I paddled a canoe across Fontana Lake in January with huge swells. That one may have been more fear based than lethal - so I am not going to count it.

You know what I find interesting about this post is that it is a subject that does not seem to get talked about much. I mean I never even thought about dead tree limbs, dead trees or even live trees falling until someone mentioned it to me one time. Now I am really careful about my site selection almost to the verge of paranoia. I'm glad you brought it up, and I hope those who have not considered this take note that this is something that needs to be taken into account when picking a site for those of us who hike amongst the trees.

It's the coconuts that I have to be wary of. Some of the jungle and beach front trees reach heights of 70 to 80 feet and a ripe (and falling) coconut can weigh several pounds, with an outer shell as hard as a rock. I've not been struck by one, but I've seen kids with serious eggs on their heads from standing around looking up as their friends cut the coconuts loose from the trees. Checking for ripe coconuts or dead palm limbs is a must do before hanging my hammock to any coconut palm trees. I'm even careful about resting under one. The falling tarantulas in the wild bananas and bamboo forests are a real aggravation too. By those I've been hit. Brum

I've jumped out of the way of falling trees twice. I was up in Weeminuche forest Colorado (Dec backpacker) last fall and saw probably 50-60mph gusts. I wandered down the trail all evening looking for a spot out of reach of dead snags, I finally found a depression thick with willows about 8 ft high, It blocked the wind great, but better, I didn't have to worry about those creeeeepy tree noises all night.

It seems like I am constantly dealing with limbs and twigs falling from trees when I'm backpacking. Maybe it's just bad luck or bad timing. At least I never had to avoid falling trees though.

I stopped one late summer night in a grove of old growth sugar pine. The first branches on most of the trees were over 100 feet off the ground and a lot of them (the branches) were dead. So I found a spot that was out from under any trees and set up camp. About an hour later a little Douglas squirrel started cutting down cones out of one the trees. Now, for those unfamiliar with sugar pine, the cones can be well over a foot long. They made a loud whistling sound followed by a resounding thump. I was so glad I wasn't under that tree. The little bugger kept it up until well after dark. I'm not sure what he thought he was going to do with them after he got them on the ground since the cones out weighed him by at least 5 or 10 times.

They were depth charges he was a droppin' <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> Ya' just out smarted him and he was peeved to all get out <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" /> Musta' been the last batch of hippie hikers that camped under him before you, what, with their 'smoke' waffing up an' all <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" /> Must'a given the little feller the munchies somethin' fierce! <img src="/forums/images/graemlins/crazy.gif" alt="" />