Terry Godbold of the historic Fort Grounds district fought the city of Coeur d'Alene to preserve trees along the Dike Road last winter. Almost two-thirds of the trees were removed. Now, Terry is saying that the large cut last winter played a role in losing 7 more large trees to Wind Storm 2015:

"Last winter a number of us tried to bring to light the fact that a certain City official was supervising the cutting of 70% of the mature trees on the Dike Road instead of the 30% that had been marked for removal by a professional Arborist. We tried to explain the potential impact of his actions and, in particular, the risk that the remaining trees, especially those on the NIC campus, had for blowdown after this tree removal operation. We stated that every tree cut increased the likelihood that the remaining trees would be even more subject to blowdown and that every time there was a blowdown, the risk of the remaining trees was increased even further.

Some of these trees have withstood wind events for 400 to 500 years. None of us expected that our projections would come true so quickly but Tuesday’s major wind event proved the validity of our concerns. I just counted nine major trees, seven of which were over 100’ tall, that blew down Tuesday night. These nine trees are just inside the Dike Road and south of the NIC childcare center. Luckily, no one was injured as the campus was virtually vacant at the time of the windstorm. And, luckily, there was no damage to any of the buildings on the campus as these trees were further away from structures than many of the remaining trees. Note the sandy soil exposed by the root ball  closest to the camera. This too means that, like Dominos, the fate of the remaining, mature trees is sealed due to their new exposure to wind forces and the lack of structural support these trees have in sandy soil.

Question: Do you think there was a connection to the large blow-down of trees in the same area near the mouth of the Spokane River?