The damaging Tuesday EF2 tornado that knocked out power for thousands left Fayetteville resident Phil Davis with a tree on his house.

Davis got an alert on his phone with that tornado warning and went on his porch. In the distant horizon, he could see a stormfront moving in.

He returned to the house to get a raincoat and by the time Davis went back out it was bearing down on us. He says minutes later it was gone as quickly as it arrived here.

“I didn’t even hear the tree fall,” he said. “I just came out to see what had happened after the intense wind and rain passed and then lo and behold I have a giant tree laying on my house.”

If the tree had landed to the right and on the roof it would have been a different story.

“It looks to me like I’ve only lost a piece of my gutter and we’ll know here in a minute after the tree guys take the tree away,” said Davis. “But really fortunate — I mean some people lost everything and all I’ve gotta do is replace a piece of gutter.”

The Fayetteville homeowner is counting his blessings.

“Luckily it was daytime so I was the only one at home with the dog,” Davis said. “So we just hunkered down and could have been a lot worse if it actually struck the main part of the house.”

According to the homeowner, the 40-foot, 60-year-old tree (that withstood the first derecho) snapped off 20- feet in the air…

“The other thing that is really amazing to me is that there’s no other trees or damage within a mile or two each way of my house and this just seems to be the singular tree that was picked out and it came down,” he said.

Tree trimmers will cut the tree completely off the house, and the main trunk into sections. Davis calls the tree a unique feature of the property.

“We’ve got a row of cedar trees right there and then forsythia under it and this was the lone hemlock, so I hate to lose that,” he said.

Though Davis says he didn’t have any sentimental attachment to the tree…

“It also kind of blocked us from Gatewood Road, as far as a little visual barrier,” he said.
Once the hemlock is completely removed, Davis can do a full assessment. He says so far there’s no leak, no penetration in the roof. It looks like the gutters have just been peeled down a bit.

“Also go in the attic and see if any wind-driven rain was forced up in under the metal,” said Davis. “And then, once I take all those pictures it’s on to the insurance company.”

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