A man sleeping on his living-room couch was critically injured when a tree crashed through the roof of his Renton apartment.
The man was hospitalized with injuries to his pelvis and was in critical but stable condition at Harborview Medical Center on Sunday afternoon. The incident occurred at 7:15 a.m., just as a windstorm blew through the area, knocking out power, and damaging power lines and trees.
The six-unit apartment in the 22200 block of 196th Avenue Southeast was damaged when a roughly 200-foot-high fir tree was toppled by the wind.
Crews with the Puget Sound Regional Fire Authority found the victim trapped under the tree that had chopped right through the roof of the two-story building.
The man, who is in his 60s, remained conscious and was pinned across his torso area, according to a news release from the fire authority. South King County and Seattle Fire also responded with rescue personnel and resources, including a crane to lift the tree.
Crews eventually freed the man by entering the apartment through the floor, according to Capt. Joe Root of the fire authority. In all, 14 units responded from around the community and the man was on the way to the hospital within 41 minutes from the initial call for help from a nearby resident, according to the news release.
Root said he could not remember ever having to respond to such a call for help. “It was my first time for a tree on a building, and the first time for somebody trapped,” Root said.
The apartment is located on a sylvan, 10-acre property, home to many large trees as well as multiple rental units, some multifamily and some single-family.”It’s a little piece of paradise,” Root said.
The same weather system blew through Eatonville where he lives, Root said, dramatically going from calm conditions to swaying trees to hail within about five minutes. There is still plenty of winter weather left in the season and he urged being prepared with food, water, and supplies to get through a power failure — and renter’s insurance — in case of storms.
Puget Sound Energy reported Sunday afternoon the utility was responding to 142 outages affecting 4,442 customers around Western Washington from Monroe to Olympia, as a result of the windstorm that raked the area.
The Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium also was closed due to a power outage.
A cold front sweeping through the region was the cause of stiff winds from the southwest gusting to 48 mph recorded at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport on Sunday morning, said Jacob DeFlitch, meteorologist with the Seattle office of the National Weather Service. A breezy, damp day is still in store for the rest of Sunday, according to the weather service.
Showers were likely overnight and snow was predicted at 2,000 to 3,000 feet, dropping to 1,500 to 2,000 feet Sunday night. Dry conditions are predicted by Monday.
