Perth, Western Australia August 23, 2008 Home News Time Out Letters Write a Letter Special Coverage Walsham Classifieds Search Real Estate Trades & Services Submit About Contact Us Advertising Legal	Tree smashes house, car Owners' plans to move into their new house will be delayed months after a 35-tonne hit from the plunging tree. With a boom like thunder, a huge Norfolk Island pine tree toppled across John Street, Cottesloe, last Friday night, pulverising a parked Mazda and smashing the front of a new house on the north side of the street. Nobody was hurt when the 20-tonne tree crashed just before 8pm on Friday. Valerie Frearson-Lane, who lives 3m from the tree, said: "I heard the thunder clap and went out to look for more. "The tree was lying across the road, on the car and on the new house. It had fallen away from my house. "The police and a council crew came very quickly. "They were magnificent." his two-week-old Mazda is a $41,939 write-off that cost the owner $250 insurance excess and his no-claim bonus. Ms Frearson-Lane said the car owner had parked it about 20 minutes earlier. She said: "It was only two weeks old – he had booked it in for its 1000km service next week." Scott Fisher (32) said he had parked his new car in heavy rain about 7.35pm and gone into a friend's house. He said: "We heard a thudding noise about 20 minutes later and there was a knock at the door minutes later and a man told me a car had been hit. "I thought it might have been a branch – but it was a dirty big tree across the bonnet, the road and the house opposite. "If I had parked it about half a metre farther forward, the tree would have hit the cabin – and me, if I'd still been in it." Scott said he had bought the Mazda Classic 6 hatch three weeks earlier and expected it to be written off. RAC said it would be written off for $41,939. "I tried to start the engine and it was like stirring a bucket of nuts and bolts," he said. "I'm told I will lose my no-claim bonus and have to pay the first $250 of the claim to RAC Insurance. "That seems a bit steep when I wasn't even sitting in it." He has had to borrow a car. He would ask Cottesloe council to help. A gap emerges in the ranks of Cottesloe's Norfolk Pines. "It was their tree," he said "and they got out of it quite lightly." The tree's roots seemed to have simply snapped, tearing out of the ground a lump of limestone capstone and an old galvanised water pipe. It crashed after two weeks of heavy rain and storms that might have disturbed the soil around its roots or weakened the rock in which it was embedded. The tree is believed to be about 100 years old – one of the original pines planted in Cottesloe by William Zimpel or John Doscas, John Street residents who took it on themselves to plant hundreds of them. Stephen Tindale, Cottesloe's chief executive, visited the scene on Saturday morning. The fallen tree was one of dozens that line John Street. He said: "At some point the pines will start to go into decline and it is our rough estimation that the time is probably nigh. "I have asked for a tree expert to investigate and to report on any other suspect pines. "Once I have the report it will go to council for a decision." The damage bill for the house is expected to go to the builder's insurance company and the car to its owner's insurance. Mr Tindale said any claim on the council, which owned the tree, would go to its insurer. Murray Turner's tree removing crew loaded up the logs and took them to Gnangara, where they will season until the council decides what it wants to do with them. He said the 35-tonne tree was simply old and weak. He said: "It would have a terrific strike-force. The whole front roof of the house will have to come down and be rebuilt because walls were cracked and roof timbers twisted. Crawley boardwalk to the boathouse vanishes under high tide and storm run-off. Do you have something to say? Write to us and we may publish your letter next week. BACK TO TOP < PREVIOUS - HOME - NEXT> Copyright © 1999 - 2008 Post Newspapers Pty Ltd. All rights reserved.