I TOLD YOU TO WATCHOUT FOR THE CABLES!

As an Arborist, an individual has to expect the unexpected! Our job is to mitigate risk, rarely do we have the ability to rid of it completely.

Think of it as a guessing game, a professional guessing game with documented and enforced requirements. By law, most trees are protected, however when it comes to private property in many cases the owner decides what goes.

In this video we got called in for a Blue Spruce, the owners concern was the branches getting to close to the power lines. The owners wanted the tree to remain and stay healthy, however we noticed the tree had codominant stems.

Usually codominant stems, especially with included bark, are a hazard bound to happen. Depending on the structural stability, one of the stems usually breaks off and can either cause damage to property or people in its surrounding.

Our professional decision was to remove the tree, but the homeowners wanted to save it. So, the only choice we had left was to clear a path where we can reach the top, shorten the tips to mitigate risk.

Working around our professional opinion, we start to remove the tips, which were growing multiple stems as well (codominant tips) as we were trying to document this project, the groundman was distracting the climber too much to the point where the climber misjudged the situation.

Without the clear perspective, caused by distraction, the climber safely removes 1 larger tip (stem). As he safely throws it to the ground clearing the power lines, last second, before he lets the branch go, he realizes there is a cable line under the power lines... The branch drops, hits the tree and angles out towards the cable, hitting the cable full on.

Still to this day, the TV cable is in the same place, it didn't come out of its bracing from the pole, indicating no damage. Wires are installed with the conscious planning that allows for such things to happen, naturally due to storms or bad weather.

As you can see from the beginning of the street the same cable is just drooping down to the floor, resting on a fruit tree.

RESULT: There wasn't any concerns, nor damages, just an unfortunate "mistake" that could've been avoided.

In different countries obviously there are different laws to abide by, different risks to watchout for. In this country the laws are more lenient because the gov doesn't really care about the people so the people have to care for themselves. What I mean by that is, there are poles knocked down, structurally failed and still in the same position waiting for bylaw officials to fix the situation, almost resembling a third-world country.

Now that you have all the details, hopefully it brings some light to this video and the mistakes that took place.