We went to bed the night of Thursday, September 5th, knowing that Hurricane Fran was approaching, but not really being very concerned. After all, we were over a hundred miles from the shore. How bad could a hurricane be that far inland? One of us, in fact, spent the evening packing for a weekend trip. We awoke to surprisingly bright sunlight. It didn't take long to discover why: the trees that had sheltered the house from the morning sun were no longer in a position to shelter anything. It also became clear that there wouldn't be any traveling that day. The driveway [85K JPEG] had so many trees down on it that the street was nowhere in sight.

It was about this time that we remembered that we'd loaned our chainsaw out to someone who had neglected to return it. He called shortly after we got up, promising to return it that morning. He quickly discovered that all roads in the area were closed, and that it would be a while before we had anything more than hand saws to work with. We bravely attacked the smallest of the trees [87K JPEG], but made little progress before getting very tired of that approach [78K JPEG].

While we waited for the chainsaw to reappear, we surveyed the property. There were, in all, 72 full-size trees down. Many were 80 to 100 feet high. Over half the downed trees were along the creek bed on one edge of the property. That was, in fact, related to why there were so many trees down so far inland.

It had rained hard for days before the hurricane arrived, and the ground was completely saturated. When the winds hit, the tall hardwood trees typical of this part of North Carolina no longer had the support their roots needed to withstand the winds. Hardwoods here have relatively small root systems [98K JPEG], and don't bend in the wind, so they just pulled out of the soft ground and quietly fell. Frequently one tree coming down would strike others, leading to a domino effect, with half a dozen or more trees coming down in a row [98K JPEG].

The hurricane and related storms dumped over 16 inches of rain on the Triangle in September. That's half of what we usually get in a year, and more than Seattle (to pick a particularly sodden example), has ever recorded in a similar period. In addition to the trees down, there was flooding everywhere. We just had our pond to contend with, but even it was far above its banks. The tree holding our duck house, for example [64K JPEG], is usually 4 feet above the water.

The chainsaw finally reappeared early that evening, and we got down to work cutting ourselves out. We were able, with the help of neighbors, to clear the driveway. We spent the next few days helping cut others out (our situation was worse than many, but by no means unique), and starting the cleanup on our land [75K JPEG].

We've been working on cleaning up after Fran since September. We're now a house where everyone has their own splitting maul, we have a special appreciation for the splitting characteristics of North Carolina hardwoods, and we know enough chainsaw jokes to last a lifetime.

When this final picture was taken [48K JPEG], we were about a third done. Firewood for life...