ATLANTA — Residents are normally fond of the century-old trees that provide grace and a canopy of cooling shade to this city's old neighborhoods. This summer, though, Atlantans are looking up with trepidation.
Many of those trees have been crashing down -- the result of a one-two punch that first weakened the roots through years of drought and then loosened their hold on the ground following months of repeated heavy rains. The storms, some carrying high winds, have toppled thick, 80-foot-high oaks like bowling pins, though no one knows exactly how many.
In one publicized case last month, a falling tree killed a woman and two children who were riding in the back seat of a sport utility vehicle through a neighborhood near downtown during a severe thunderstorm. The woman's husband, who was driving, was uninjured. The incident came less than two weeks after a visiting professor from Japan was crushed to death in his car when a limb came loose from an oak, also during a storm.
The deaths, combined with the seemingly constant succession of rainstorms, have caused homeowners to glance anxiously at the trees on their properties and swamp tree specialists with requests for house calls.
Joe Piffaretti, who recently bought a home surrounded by oaks in East Point, a few miles south of Atlanta, said he finds himself paying special attention to weather forecasts.
"I tend to be clicking on weather.com and that kind of thing on a regular basis," said Piffaretti, director of development for the nonprofit group Trees Atlanta.
Piffaretti called an arborist to examine the trees on his lot. Last week, the specialist recommended the removal of a 60-year-old white oak that Piffaretti thought lent beauty and character to his property. The tree suffered from root rot that likely was made worse by the wetness of the ground.
Four years of drought followed by one of the wettest stretches on record throughout the Southeast created hazardous conditions for the old trees. Ed Macie, regional urban forester with the U.S. Forest Service in Atlanta, described a string of factors: roots weakened from extended dry weather, rain-saturated ground and trees made top-heavy and tottery because of a burst of new growth fed by all of the moisture.
"I noticed this in June and July. Just driving around I could see extensive growth, a second flush," Macie said.
