352 Arboriculture & Urban Forestry 2014. 40(6): 352-354 Editorial Response Editorial Response FATALITIES AND INJURIES CAUSED BY TREES: DO WE HAVE A PROBLEM? Julian Dunster Concerns about tree risk are increasingly com- mon. High profile news reports about trees killing or injuring people in the United King- dom, Australia, and North America are com- mon. Responses range from, “It was an act of god,” through to, “We repeatedly said it would fail.” In the United States, courts have imposed multimillion dollar settlements on tree owners. In the United Kingdom, several judgments have caused tree owners to fell the trees rather than manage the risk. A tree fatality in British Colum- bia, Canada, led to the creation of the Certified Tree Risk Assessor accreditation, which launched in 2005. The program was specifically developed to respond to a concern of WorkSafe British Columbia (the government agency charged with enforcing the Occupational Health and Safety Regulations) regarding tree risk issues and worker safety. The Tree Risk Assessment Course and Exam (TRACE) was the first such course in North America. This course and credential lead to the ISA Tree Risk Assessment Qualification (TRAQ), which launched in 2013. Other risk assessment schemes and courses, such as Quantified Tee Risk Assessment (QTRA) and Tree Hazard: Risk Evaluation and Treatment System (THREATS), have evolved in the United Kingdom. TRACE, TRAQ, and the ISA’s Best Management Practices booklet for tree risk assessment have raised the standard of care for tree risk assessments. As a result, more arborists are aware of the need for tree risk assessment and tree owners are under- taking risk assessment and risk management in a more diligent manner. All of this is surely a positive step forward, but will it affect the num- ber of people killed or injured by tree failures? ©2014 International Society of Arboriculture Perceptions about tree risk issues vary widely. Some people may simply feel threatened by trees regardless of the risk issues. Others may feel that the tree failure incidents are extremely rare, and overall risk is low. Therefore, it is argued, it is not justifiable to spend a lot of money dealing with tree risk issues. The reality may be different, but until recently, there were few if any continuously updated databases in many parts of the world to show just how extensive the problem might be. In order to better understand the magnitude of tree failure incidents, where tree failures kill or injure people, a more global documentation proj- ect was initiated in 2007, testing a series of English- language Google Alerts™ word combinations. Once the word combinations were refined, a more comprehensive database of incidents from around the world was started in 2008, and is ongoing. (The data relies on reports published in, or translated to English. It is entirely possible that the numbers of incidents documented would be higher around the world if all language reports were included.) The intent is to document order of magnitude esti- mates about how many people are actually killed or injured by trees. The data do not deal with tree workers within or near the trees. Rather, the data collected concerns people who have no direct con- nection with the tree—people walking, cycling, or driving by in their homes or backyards, or using trails in parks. There is no distinction in the data between trees on public versus private land. There are constraints on the data. It is based on the search engine scanning headlines and news- paper reports. The scope and veracity of the data depends on several factors, such as the number of reports available online and how well any one report accurately reflects the events. Checking new headlines about past events, it is apparent that the aggregate data is oſten preliminary in nature. For example, later headlines reveal that an injured person has since succumbed. In other cases, and
November 2014
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