10
THE DAVEY BULLETIN
|
January/February 2025
MISSION
WASHINGTON BOMB CYCLONE
A late November bomb cyclone left Washington state's
Puget Sound region with close to 1 million power outages,
according to Micah Fazio, area manager, Pacific Northwest,
Davey Tree Surgery Company.
Seven, three-person Surgery Company crews from the
Seattle City Light and Snohomish County PUD accounts
assisted both utilities, as well as the Seattle Department of
Transportation, to clear trees off of power lines and roads for
one week.
"This storm was labeled as a decade storm, meaning we
hadn't had a storm like this in about 10 years," Fazio said.
"Our prevailing winds are typically from the southwest. With
this storm, the way that the cyclone was spinning off the
coast – it was drawing all the air from east to west. The wind
was coming from a different direction and that's what made
it so catastrophic."
Fazio said their clients were very happy with Davey's
response and sent letters thanking the crews.
All field employees in the Residential/Commercial services'
Southeast Seattle, Northwest Seattle, and Tacoma offices
worked on storm cleanup for several weeks, with additional
work expected in the coming months for the Southeast
Seattle and Tacoma offices.
Jason Hayes, district manager, Southeast Seattle office,
said Michael Spaulding, district manager, Portland, Oregon
office, assisted, along with six employees from that office.
The West Denver office's Anthony Difronzo, tree care
coordinator, along with the North Denver office's foremen
Devon Premer and Maxwell Olsen, traveled in to assist for
several weeks.
Two additional West Denver office
employees, foremen Alex Von
Kreisler and Ryan Pinto, traveled
to the Tacoma office to assist with
storm cleanup for a few weeks.
"They were a huge help," Tyson
Geldseth, district manager, Tacoma
office, said. "Everyone was on the
same page and was getting along."
Jason Maize, district manager,
Northwest Seattle office, said his
crews were happy to help the
community. While done with storm
cleanup for now, he said calls may
come in off and on for months,
when people find storm damage
they didn't notice until later.
Right: Jason Hayes, district manager,
Southeast Seattle office, is pictured on
a sales call, in front of the gigantic root
ball of a Western red cedar tree that fell
on a client's property in Sammamish,
Washington, post-bomb cyclone.
Nathan Weldon, climber, Snohomish PUD account,
is removing branches from a communication wire.
Left: Seattle City
Light account's
Frank Bartholomew,
foreman, Ian Publicover,
climber, and Bryce
Stetson, groundperson,
removed the wood of
this ash tree that was
hanging off the sides of
the bus, to prepare for
SDOT's grapple truck to
lift the remaining wood
off the top of it. "The
road was opened up to
traffic after we cleared
five or six large ash
trees from it," Micah
Fazio said.
