Old, rotting Acacia tree falls on highway in Carcar city; Impact misses neighbors

CLOSE CALL AT 4:30 AM

Another old Acacia tree falls. It took seven hours to cut up and remove the tree, which blocked the national highway in barangay Perrelos, Carcar City till 11:30a.m. (CDN PHOTO/JUNJIE MENDOZA)

His family was sleeping soundly when a loud thud woke them at 4:30 am.

Jun Bacon, his wife and two daughters got up, thinking a typhoon had hit barangay Perrelos, Carcar City.

Outside, they found the old Acacia tree across the road had fallen, blocking the national highway in south Cebu.

“It was all unexpected. Before we slept last night, there was no strong wind or heavy rain,” Bacon said.

The branches partly damaged the house roof and a repair shop owned by a 67-year-old neighbor.

The fallen tree was bigger than the Acacia that fell last month in the next town of San Fernando, blocking the national highway and tying up traffic for hours, said Perrelos barangay captain Richard Ybanez.

The tree in Carcar, one of several old Acacias that provide a leafy canopy in barangay Perrelos, was one of five trees identified in Carcar last week for “sanitation cutting” by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) 7 because of advanced decay.

“The crown of the tree is too heavy.  The tree which is numbered 351 was  recommended for immediate cutting in an assessment done last week,” said Eddie Llamedo, DENR 7 spokesman.

The agency earlier announced a schedule for tree cutting of old, sickly and hazardous trees starting Monday, but these are located in the next towns of Naga and San Fernando.

The trees are located along a road widening project for the South Road implemented by the Department of Public Works and Highways from Naga to Carcar cities.

It took seven hours for a DPWH crew to cut up the fallen tree and remove the parts yesterday.

Traffic flow was affected from Carcar city to Sangat, San Fernando town and returned to normal at 11:30 a.m.  Traffic aides guided vehicles to detours but no power failure was reported.

Boom trucks and chainsaws were used, said maintenance engineer Roy Alvizo, whose crew worked while a light rain fell.

Nobody was injured when the tree fell, damaging the front of Bacon’s rented house used as a family-run sewing shop.

The old acacia tree was 195 centimeters wide and stood around 18 meters high.

Before it fell, Bacon and his family were already worried about the danger of the tree falling and planned to report the matter to barangay officials.

DENR’s Llamedo said the tree was in an advanced stage of decay at the base near the root system.

“The crown of the tree was too heavy. The tree which is numbered 351 was recommended for immediate cutting in an assessment conducted last week,” Llamedo said.

He said DENR-7 Regional Director Isabelo Montejo instructed them to complete the assessment of all trees in Carcar City yesterday and to submit a  report on Monday.

“After the report we can expedite the issuance of a special tree cutting permit after getting clearance,” Llamedo said.

“Similar to the San Fernando trees, we asked the mayor and the barangay captains to issue a certification interposing no objection on the sanitation cutting,” he added.

Based on DENR-7’s assessment yesterday, of the remaining trees at barangay Perrelos, four are defective.

Two of the four are Acacias numbered 347 and 353 with diameters 165 centimeters and 73 centimeters respectively. The other two are Gmelina trees, which are fast growth trees used tree planting campaigns.

He said he wasn’t sure if these were century old heritage trees since he hasn’t seen any declaration by the National Historical Commission of Philippines or local officials about the trees in Carcar City.

He said the DENR-7 allocated more than 500 molave saplings which are more than a meter tall for replanting the roadside from Naga City to Carcar City after scheduled cutting of at least 40 diseased and decaying trees.

NO ONE WAS HURT

Jun Bacon stands in front of his damaged house, whose front was hit by large branches of the Acacia that fell across the street onto the house in sitio Katungaan, Perrelos Carcar City. (CDN PHOTO/ JUNJIE MENDOZA)

Perrelos barangay captain Ybanez said no one was hurt when the incident happened.

“I suggested that those trees should be cut but let us just wait for the DENR-7 for the final decision,” Ybanez said.

An appliance repair shop owned by 67-year-old Virgilio Soterol was partly damaged.

He wasn’t home when the tree fell.  He and his wife usually sleep in the shop.

“We were attending Mass. I was just surprised when I got home,” Soterol said.

For now, they will sleep in their house which is a few steps away.

Refrigerator units for repair and other appliances were pulled out of the shop while family members removed branches that covered the front door of the shop.

Terry Suerte, a resident in her 50s,  said she has been complaining since last year about the danger posed by the tree in front of her store.

She said she went to the barangay hall to report it and was referred to the DENR and the DPWH, but she didn’t know where to find their offices.

Suerte said that recently she told a barangay councilor that the branches of the Acacia were already reaching the roof of her store.

At 4:30 a.m.  she was about to open her store when she heard an unusual sound.

“I thought it was the blast of a machine gun firing at my store so I crawled on the floor and held on to a house post,” she said

When she looked up, the tree branches were already hanging outside  the window.

If the incident had happened a little earlier at 5 a.m. when she usually gets up to buy bread in a nearby bakery, she said she wouldn’t be as lucky as her surname suggests.

“Siguro ko, di na ko suerte, dimalas ko,” she laughed.

(I’m sure I wouldn’t be lucky.  I would be the victim of bad luck.)/ With reports from Jhunnex Napallacan and Edison delos Angeles

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