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Newspaper Archive of
Shelton Mason County Journal
Shelton, Washington
January 13, 2022     Shelton Mason County Journal
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January 13, 2022
 
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Page A-4 Shelton-Mason County Journal - Thursday, Jan. '13, 2022 The night of breaking trees his is the second time I I’ve written the head- line “The night of breaking trees” for a newspa- per. The first was for a story in The about an ice storm that hit in the fi- nal week of 1996. It worked then, and after talking to Lake Kokanee-area residents Charles and Frieda Osborne last week, it works for this story in this edition of this newspaper. , Sometimes 25-year-old headlines don’t age. Theill-effects of last week’s storm were multiple and freakish: Trees toppled across U.S. Highway 101 north of Eldon “like match- sticks,” according to the woman behind the counter at the Lilliwaup store on Friday; water gushed from several fissures along the hillside next to U.S.. 101; roads in the Skokoim'sh Valley were acces- sible only to fish and boats; snow piled up 2 feet and high- er around Lake Cushman; prolonged power outages hit the Tahuya Peninsula; KIRK ERICSON THESE .flMES a Friday morning king tide pushed Hood Canal water over bulkheads; snow shut all of the major state moun- tain passes; and miles of Interstate 5 were out of order through the Chehalis Valley. This hasn’t been a brief ' storm either. It all started Dec. with snow and tem- peratures that would bottom out in the teens, and it con- tinues into this week, with a couple of inches of rainfall forecast through todayl That ‘ rain will add to the 7.76 inch- es of precipitation we’ve had from Jan. 1 through Monday, “HHMSNDWEIWWUB, according to the National Weather Service’s station that covers the Olympia area. Normal monthly precipita- tion through Jan. 10 is 2.86 inches. It’s a lot to remember, and memories of storms survive as'most memory survives, in bits, mostly unhitched from dates and numbers. We re- member sights, sounds and emotions, but many of the de-p tails of this storm will fade — until they’re sum- moned again. . Last Friday was a lovely afternoon in the county, a respite from what had been. . The sky was spotless blue and the Olympics looked fit for a Greek deity. Along Cushman- Potlatch Road, I met the Os- bomes as they walked back to. their home on Kokanee Ridge Drive, carrying a bag of pro- visions from Lake Cushman Store. Their car was snowed in. I gave them a ride back to their property, where they told a story. ' I saw a hint to that story: A fallen limb had left a deep dent in their neighbor’s metal garage and a tall tree of slight girth was leaning against the house. Tree limbs littered the ground. Charles Osborne said they V slept four nights on the main floor of their home, instead of on the top floor where they usually sleep. That started Sunday night. “I was so scared,” Charles said about that Sunday night. “More scared than I’ve ever been.” He said they were in bed, listening to the loud cracks that tolled every minute or so. The rain Was drenching the snow that clung to limbs, causing the wood to break under the strain. Tree debris scattered around the north- ern part of the county was mostly severed limbs and tree fragments that fractured . along the trunk ‘I saw few uprooted trees. Perhaps you’ve experi- enced what the Osbornes ex- perienced that night. I have. My‘home also is Surround- ed by tall trees, including a sequoia in the backyard that ' would require six adult arms to encircle. On the night of that ice storm in 1996, which is a year I had to summon from the way back machine, Mrs. Ericson and I, and prob- ably our 2-year-old boy, laid in bed as the exact sounds the Osbornes stayed awake to sounded through our neighborhood. I remember hearing the cracks that night and trying to judge our distance from each crack, perhaps like civil- ians in war try to judge the distance of artillery. With each crack, I’d wait for the c0uple'of seconds itmight take fer that sequoia, or any other tree, to crash through the roof and send the three of us into eternity, or at least onto the bottom floor. Then I’d wait for the next crack, and the next, and. the next. Here’s to quieter — and drier and warmer- nights ahead. I Contact Kirk Ericson at kirk@masbncounty.com Thankvour between the local community and the and especially competence. Better yet, perhaps believing in his own mind) it