18
THE DAVEY BULLETIN
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September/October 2019
HAZARD TREE REMOVAL GOES INTO THE NIGHT
Crews from The Care of Trees (TCOT), a Davey company,
Mount Vernon office, worked through the night to prevent
an oak tree from falling on a client's home.
The client called worried about the tree, which stood next
to their house and was splitting, said Greg Elliffe, district
manager. While talking with the contractor working on their
deck, the client noticed that the tree was splitting at its
lowest crotch.
"It was a 50-inch tree, and the one side of it was literally
going to land on the house if it fell," Elliffe said. "It was just
a matter of time. It was a windy day and you could see it
separating by two or three inches."
Elliffe called a couple crews together to remove the leader
hanging over the house that comprised half the tree. The
crews used wraps to help secure the tree by tying it
together, hand winches, a bucket truck and other equipment.
Floodlights and headlamps were used to illuminate the
tree so they could work into the night to make the tree
safe for the client.
"They cut sections out of the tree until it was low enough
and safe enough to get through the night," Elliffe said. "We
got the limbs down to get weight out of the tree. We didn't
climb the tree and did everything from the bucket."
The careful, slow work lasted three days.
Working at night is not something Elliffe's crews do regularly,
but with the stability of the tree in question there wasn't
much of a choice. His advice for working on a project like
this at night was not to do it unless it's absolutely necessary,
and that you need to have faith in the ability of your team
to complete it safely.
"I'm incredibly proud of them," Elliffe said. "There was
no hesitation when I told them that we had a real issue.
Everybody took it very seriously. I couldn't be prouder of
how they worked together to solve this situation. They are
pretty cool guys."
MISSION
Nardo Espinosa, Jesus Martinez, Breidys Melendez, Angel Mota and
Reymi Santana Ortega were the crew who assisted Greg Elliffe with
this removal. Elliffe was proud of how well this crew communicated with
each other by making sure everyone was on the same page and not
being afraid to take timeouts to readjust the plan throughout the night.
