Ice Storm Aftermath
Well, here it is. The tour of the neighborhood showing the destruction from the December ice storm.
These were taken about ten days after the storm, all within a quarter-mile square area. Our neighborhood was among the worst hit in the city, apparently. These pictures will bear out this assertion.
There are a ton of pictures under the cut, so dial-uppers beware, but I didn't feel like separating this into three freaking posts and clogging everyone's f-lists.
Looking northwest from the crossroads outside our house, you can see piles of fallen limbs in everyone's yards.
This is our neighbor's fence (and our house in the background). All of this crap came out of his yard, which wasn't as badly hit as ours. Hardly fair, considering about a quarter of the shit that had to be cut out of our yard came from trees in HIS yard. It's sitting in his yard now, though, so he can suck it.
Wow. That is a pretty pine tree. Was.
Walking toward the park, you can see piles of limbs in everyone's yard. You really need to click through and go to "all sizes" to get the full effect on a lot of these street shots. Remember in the phone post when I said it looked like someone had "shit kindling" all over the place? Do you believe me now?
Standing on the corner just before Turner Park, looking west (toward the crazy cat lady's hoarding house), you can see piles of crap all up and down the street. Go full size for the complete effect.
Someone's magnolia tree. Parts of it, anyway.
These people, on the other side of that same corner, got hit especially hard. Their large yard has a lot of big trees. The pile of debris stretches all the way along the length of their property, and is as tall as their five-foot fence.
Another view of the same side of the same yard.
But wait!
The brush pile continues along the front of their property as well!
Again, I stress that this is a very large piece of property, about twice the size of a normal yard (and midwestern yards are big). The pile of branches runs the full length of it on two sides.
And here we have the park. The devastation was truly awful.
This tree is no longer tree-shaped.
And the park proper. This beautiful tree is one I have posed in front of for pictures. It just split and fell. You can't see the branches extending out of frame on the left.
That is a jungle gym to the side and slightly behind it, but it is still hard to get a good idea of scale, so here is my six-foot husband acting as a human yardstick for your edification.
All I can say to that is "Holy shit."
It just . . . broke.
You can see in the first and last pictures that it was rotting a little down through the middle, which no doubt weakened it.
Looking east over some of the branches, toward Rogers High.
More of the branches, and me waving at the camera with my shadow.
This were taken standing at the end of the fallen trunk and branches, looking directly toward the tree.
It practically exploded. I mean, crap.
(Yes, that's my finger, and it's there on purpose to blot out the sun.)
More broken trees, and Rogers High in the background.
Enlarge this and just look at all the broken limbs. Every tree. Every single one.
These two pictures were taken heading south toward the rec building, you can see that every tree in the frame has had limbs twisted off of it, and there is a massive pile of debris. Enlarge these to see the damage.
Here is Sargon standing next to the enormous pile of debris shed by this cluster of trees.
Someone has to clean this shit up, and I am glad it's not me.
We've reached the corner of the park and are about to start heading uphill toward the school.
This is looking west from the southwest corner of Turner park. More and more piles of shit.
A quick about-face, and we are facing east, uphill toward Rogers.
On the left is a colossal pile of limbs. You can't tell yet, but it's about as long as three buses.
See? I shit you not.
Here we are looking slightly to the left at the other side of the rec building.
God, that blue sky is gorgeous. The trees, on the other hand, are fucked.
I give you my word these were all tree-shaped, beautiful trees.
On the other side of the street, massive piles of crap, and one really fucked-up tree.
Some didn't break. They just bent.
These used to be perky, conical trees. Now they really need a support bra.
I am putting in all of these relatively boring pictures of people's yards so that you can get an idea of just how ubiquitous and widespread the damage was, and how ugly the aftermath is.
Enlarge this one, looking down a side street, to see branches absolutely lining it. This is a street they had to bulldoze twice to clear.
BULLDOZED.
Fuck me running.
We're coming up on the crest of the hill, and passing Rogers High.
Here is the area between the athletic field and the school.
It is a total mess.
I always thought Rogers looked like a Buffy high school. I can't pass it without thinking about vampires. And now look at all that great stake material! PILES OF IT.
Sargon standing next to half a tree.
More destruction.
We've hit the top of the hill and are turning back north.
This is - was - one of my favorite trees. A big, leafy tree that turned red in autumn, and whose branches hung just low enough for me to reach up and stroke with my fingers. I shook hands with it almost every day.
It probably won't make it.
Heading home. This tree is beside itself.
Looking downhill, the length of 4th Street. The school is to your left. And all along your right are piles of broken limbs.
Some of them are car-sized.
More piles of branches.
There is a particularly huge, dense one in the upper left of the top picture, enlarged below. That's the other side of the looong brush pile we saw earlier, before reaching the park.
And so on, until we get home again.
Our neighbor's trees. These are the trees that grew over the driveway and which he never trimmed and which we had to have cut all the way back to the fence at our expense after the storm brought them all down.
This is also the guy with the barking dogs.
Bastard.
As you can see from his accomodations, suing him for damages would be futile. He's broke.
Now, remember this picture, where I said that there really was a driveway there, with a detached garage?
Here is a view back along the cleared driveway. Every tree you see had to be cut from the fenceline over, because they had all fallen into our yard.
Amazingly, the fence survived.
This, by the way, is the branch I actually saw fall from my kitchen window. Ice positively exploded from it. It was very cool.
Anyway, that's what things looked like around here, and still look like in most parts of the city, which haven't been cleaned up. Not a pretty sight.
These were taken about ten days after the storm, all within a quarter-mile square area. Our neighborhood was among the worst hit in the city, apparently. These pictures will bear out this assertion.
There are a ton of pictures under the cut, so dial-uppers beware, but I didn't feel like separating this into three freaking posts and clogging everyone's f-lists.
Looking northwest from the crossroads outside our house, you can see piles of fallen limbs in everyone's yards.
This is our neighbor's fence (and our house in the background). All of this crap came out of his yard, which wasn't as badly hit as ours. Hardly fair, considering about a quarter of the shit that had to be cut out of our yard came from trees in HIS yard. It's sitting in his yard now, though, so he can suck it.
Wow. That is a pretty pine tree. Was.
Walking toward the park, you can see piles of limbs in everyone's yard. You really need to click through and go to "all sizes" to get the full effect on a lot of these street shots. Remember in the phone post when I said it looked like someone had "shit kindling" all over the place? Do you believe me now?
Standing on the corner just before Turner Park, looking west (toward the crazy cat lady's hoarding house), you can see piles of crap all up and down the street. Go full size for the complete effect.
Someone's magnolia tree. Parts of it, anyway.
These people, on the other side of that same corner, got hit especially hard. Their large yard has a lot of big trees. The pile of debris stretches all the way along the length of their property, and is as tall as their five-foot fence.
Another view of the same side of the same yard.
But wait!
The brush pile continues along the front of their property as well!
Again, I stress that this is a very large piece of property, about twice the size of a normal yard (and midwestern yards are big). The pile of branches runs the full length of it on two sides.
And here we have the park. The devastation was truly awful.
This tree is no longer tree-shaped.
And the park proper. This beautiful tree is one I have posed in front of for pictures. It just split and fell. You can't see the branches extending out of frame on the left.
That is a jungle gym to the side and slightly behind it, but it is still hard to get a good idea of scale, so here is my six-foot husband acting as a human yardstick for your edification.
All I can say to that is "Holy shit."
It just . . . broke.
You can see in the first and last pictures that it was rotting a little down through the middle, which no doubt weakened it.
Looking east over some of the branches, toward Rogers High.
More of the branches, and me waving at the camera with my shadow.
This were taken standing at the end of the fallen trunk and branches, looking directly toward the tree.
It practically exploded. I mean, crap.
(Yes, that's my finger, and it's there on purpose to blot out the sun.)
More broken trees, and Rogers High in the background.
Enlarge this and just look at all the broken limbs. Every tree. Every single one.
These two pictures were taken heading south toward the rec building, you can see that every tree in the frame has had limbs twisted off of it, and there is a massive pile of debris. Enlarge these to see the damage.
Here is Sargon standing next to the enormous pile of debris shed by this cluster of trees.
Someone has to clean this shit up, and I am glad it's not me.
We've reached the corner of the park and are about to start heading uphill toward the school.
This is looking west from the southwest corner of Turner park. More and more piles of shit.
A quick about-face, and we are facing east, uphill toward Rogers.
On the left is a colossal pile of limbs. You can't tell yet, but it's about as long as three buses.
See? I shit you not.
Here we are looking slightly to the left at the other side of the rec building.
God, that blue sky is gorgeous. The trees, on the other hand, are fucked.
I give you my word these were all tree-shaped, beautiful trees.
On the other side of the street, massive piles of crap, and one really fucked-up tree.
Some didn't break. They just bent.
These used to be perky, conical trees. Now they really need a support bra.
I am putting in all of these relatively boring pictures of people's yards so that you can get an idea of just how ubiquitous and widespread the damage was, and how ugly the aftermath is.
Enlarge this one, looking down a side street, to see branches absolutely lining it. This is a street they had to bulldoze twice to clear.
BULLDOZED.
Fuck me running.
We're coming up on the crest of the hill, and passing Rogers High.
Here is the area between the athletic field and the school.
It is a total mess.
I always thought Rogers looked like a Buffy high school. I can't pass it without thinking about vampires. And now look at all that great stake material! PILES OF IT.
Sargon standing next to half a tree.
More destruction.
We've hit the top of the hill and are turning back north.
This is - was - one of my favorite trees. A big, leafy tree that turned red in autumn, and whose branches hung just low enough for me to reach up and stroke with my fingers. I shook hands with it almost every day.
It probably won't make it.
Heading home. This tree is beside itself.
Looking downhill, the length of 4th Street. The school is to your left. And all along your right are piles of broken limbs.
Some of them are car-sized.
More piles of branches.
There is a particularly huge, dense one in the upper left of the top picture, enlarged below. That's the other side of the looong brush pile we saw earlier, before reaching the park.
And so on, until we get home again.
Our neighbor's trees. These are the trees that grew over the driveway and which he never trimmed and which we had to have cut all the way back to the fence at our expense after the storm brought them all down.
This is also the guy with the barking dogs.
Bastard.
As you can see from his accomodations, suing him for damages would be futile. He's broke.
Now, remember this picture, where I said that there really was a driveway there, with a detached garage?
Here is a view back along the cleared driveway. Every tree you see had to be cut from the fenceline over, because they had all fallen into our yard.
Amazingly, the fence survived.
This, by the way, is the branch I actually saw fall from my kitchen window. Ice positively exploded from it. It was very cool.
Anyway, that's what things looked like around here, and still look like in most parts of the city, which haven't been cleaned up. Not a pretty sight.