Mike Fisher and Gabriel Pimentel heard a rumbling outside their house.
Moments later, a loud thud shook their walls.
“We thought somebody was going to run through our house with a car,” said Fisher, a 22-year-old criminology senior. “That’s how low loud it was. That’s how close it sounded.”
At about 1:40 p.m. Thursday, a massive oak tree in front of Fisher’s house, located in the 2800 block of Northwest 27th Terrace, tipped over and landed on West University Avenue, damaging two cars, injuring one person and shutting down the road for about three hours.
The tree’s branches took down several power lines, cutting off power for houses around the block, including Fisher’s.
A Gainesville Regional Utilities worker used a cherry picker to repair loose power lines and a damaged transformer.
Once power to the cables was shut off, a Gainesville Fire Rescue crew freed a 30-year-old woman trapped in her Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder under the tree.
An ambulance rushed her to Shands at UF with minor injuries, Gainesville Police spokesman Ben Tobias said.
The tree also fell on a Honda Civic, shattering the back window. The driver, David Kilgore, was not injured.
Kilgore, a 24-year-old UF alumnus, said he was driving several feet in front of the woman’s car before the tree fell.
“A half-second earlier, it would have been a problem,” he said. “This is a moment that made me really appreciate life.”
As GPD officers redirected eastbound and westbound traffic down toward Southwest Second Avenue, GRU crews worked to clear the tree from the road.
Crews also used saws to cut the fallen tree while Florida Department of Corrections work release inmates helped clear the road.
At 4:45 p.m., police reopened traffic lanes on West University Avenue, according to a GPD news release.
Contact Chris Alcantara at calcantara@alligator.org.
A damaged Mitsubishi Eclipse Spyder sits under a large oak tree Thursday afternoon. Earlier that day, the tree tipped over and landed on West University Avenue, blocking eastbound and westbound traffic for about three hours. A Gainesville Fire Rescue crew freed a 30-year-old woman trapped in the car and rushed her to Shands at UF.
A tree tipped over and landed on West University Avenue, blocking eastbound and westbound traffic for about three hours. A Gainesville Fire Rescue crew freed a 30-year-old woman trapped in the car and rushed her to Shands at UF.
