The branch of a tall hackberry tree near the Reitz Union snapped and nearly injured a man Tuesday. Workers will cut the tree down today.
At about 11:30 a.m. Tuesday, the branch — which a worker said weighed about 4,000 pounds — brushed the man and knocked him to the ground, said 20-year-old UF economics junior Amanda Dempsey.
The man then stood up and continued walking, she said.
“That person should probably go play the lottery tonight,” said Eddie Lake, a shop foreman of equipment for UF’s Physical Plant Division.
After the accident, students notified an employee at the Reitz Union Information Desk, who then called the physical plant.
Anthony Black, who works at the desk, held a pair of gray earbuds in his hand, left behind by the man and turned in by a student.
As the roughly 20-foot branch covered a large stretch of sidewalk, one worker used a chainsaw to cut the moss-covered wood into pieces.
The hydraulic claw of a grapple truck then picked up the chunks of branch.
The tree’s old age and Tuesday’s winds likely caused the incident, said Phillip Seay, a maintenance supervisor.
A worker later found a 1-foot-deep cavity inside the tree’s trunk, prompting the decision to cut it down. It will either be used for mulch or taken to the biomass plant, Seay said.
By 11 a.m. today, Seay said, the tree should be gone.
“We’ll take it down to prevent it from falling in the future,” he said.
Contact Martin Vassolo at mvassolo@alligator.org and follow him on Twitter @martindvassolo.
The branch from a hackberry tree outside McCarty Hall snapped Tuesday morning. The roughly 20-foot long, 4,000-pound limb nearly injured a man as it fell, but it only brushed him, knocking him to the ground said UF economics junior Amanda Dempsey.
