In the Rondout this morning, where the top of Ravine Street meets West Pierpont, a locust tree — easily 40 feet high — pulled its roots free of the rain-soaked earth and toppled over across the street below, bringing down power lines and blocking off the street in the process.
Across the street, built onto a great rock, is a house divided into four apartments whose doors let out onto a long, covered balcony. The falling locust had smashed the wooden stairway which connects the balcony to the sidewalk. The occupants who were home were now trapped. They had to await the arrival of fire trucks and Central Hudson.
The crossarm of the telephone pole had also been yanked free, Still fastened to the power transmission lines, it hung down over the street.
All the houses near were without power, probably cut off for safety. No hanging wires spit electricity.
On this Labor Day Monday, it may be harder to muster the needed workers to remove the tree and restore the utilities. As of the noontime firehouse siren which howls over the hills of the Rondout from Connelly, the chainsaws had begun to grumble and whine.
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