Mooring under trees

[MtB]

I'm not entirely convinced the EA as the navigation authority has any responsibility for sorting out partially fallen trees which are not blocking the navigation. I reckon the EA bod on the phone was broadly right, not the EA's pigeon. It's up to the land owner and tree owner to fix. 

 

 

 

 

[frangar]

7 hours ago, MtB said:

I'm not entirely convinced the EA as the navigation authority has any responsibility for sorting out partially fallen trees which are not blocking the navigation. I reckon the EA bod on the phone was broadly right, not the EA's pigeon. It's up to the land owner and tree owner to fix. 

 

 

 

 

If it could injure someone on EA land/water then I would hope they might at least contact the landlord of the land the tree is on once they have been informed of a incident if only to protect their own arse. 

[MtB]

3 hours ago, frangar said:

If it could injure someone on EA land/water then I would hope they might at least contact the landlord of the land the tree is on once they have been informed of a incident if only to protect their own arse. 

 

 

Indeed, it would be the decent thing to do. But I was commenting on who, if anyone, might carry legal responsibility. 

 

Lets imagine the partially fallen tree does later in fact, fall of a passing boat or person, and it is damaged and/or they are injured or killed. Who gets sued, and d for what? 

[tree monkey]

31 minutes ago, MtB said:

 

 

Indeed, it would be the decent thing to do. But I was commenting on who, if anyone, might carry legal responsibility. 

 

Lets imagine the partially fallen tree does later in fact, fall of a passing boat or person, and it is damaged and/or they are injured or killed. Who gets sued, and d for what? 

The landowner...

How much responsibility a specific landowner varies, it is expected that large landowners particularly those that allow or encourage public access have a higher standard of responsibility than Mrs Miggins who has a tree in her front garden.

 

 

[Stroudwater1]

I fear there’s likely to be trouble brewing with Ash die back, very large numbers by canals are affected.

 

There’s sadly going to need to be a lot of work to sort them out, branches will certainly fall from them if not addressed soon. Highways England / councils have been chopping swathes of ash down round here. Sadly it’s an accident waiting to happen. 
 

A friend owns a wood and were asked to fell a diseased beech by the footpath by the council on safety grounds which they did. Surprised to see little evidence of felling recently by canals.  

[Alan de Enfield]

1 hour ago, MtB said:

 

 

Indeed, it would be the decent thing to do. But I was commenting on who, if anyone, might carry legal responsibility. 

 

Lets imagine the partially fallen tree does later in fact, fall of a passing boat or person, and it is damaged and/or they are injured or killed. Who gets sued, and d for what? 

 

 

Our local estate has a 'lot of trees' and some are alongside the road where there is a railway level crossing with gates.

The estate were concerned about the condition of some of the trees and applied to the local council for permission to fell them (don't know why they had to ask). Permission was refused.

 

About 6 months later a queue of cars were waiting for the crossing gates to open when one of the trees toppled, a branch went thru a car windscreen and killed the driver.

The estate were held to be negligent and they were 'were the cause of death'. It all got very nasty when the refusal of permission to fell the 'dangerous' trees  got out into the local press, but amazingly the estate were absolved of all blame and nothing was heard (in public) again about who was responsible.

[Tracy D'arth]

Its all an act of god if you so believe.

[PaulJ]

3 hours ago, MtB said:

 

 

Indeed, it would be the decent thing to do. But I was commenting on who, if anyone, might carry legal responsibility. 

 

Lets imagine the partially fallen tree does later in fact, fall of a passing boat or person, and it is damaged and/or they are injured or killed. Who gets sued, and d for what? 

Heres the hanging steelwork near Ditchford. Well complained about to the EA for ages (dont know how long but I passed it several times) before it finally got took down. If two widebeams were passing I would have thought the one heading upstrem would have had a good chance of hitting it.

Photo taken by Chop Wales.

 

[Proper Charlie]

3 hours ago, Stroudwater1 said:

I fear there’s likely to be trouble brewing with Ash die back, very large numbers by canals are affected.

 

There’s sadly going to need to be a lot of work to sort them out, branches will certainly fall from them if not addressed soon. Highways England / councils have been chopping swathes of ash down round here. Sadly it’s an accident waiting to happen. 
 

A friend owns a wood and were asked to fell a diseased beech by the footpath by the council on safety grounds which they did. Surprised to see little evidence of felling recently by canals.  

We met the wife of a tree surgeon on the canals last year. She said he was horrified at the state of ash trees beside the cut and refused to moor near one. Once you know how to spot the signs of dieback (not difficult) it’s probably a good idea to do the same.

[tree monkey]

3 hours ago, Stroudwater1 said:

I fear there’s likely to be trouble brewing with Ash die back, very large numbers by canals are affected.

 

There’s sadly going to need to be a lot of work to sort them out, branches will certainly fall from them if not addressed soon. Highways England / councils have been chopping swathes of ash down round here. Sadly it’s an accident waiting to happen. 
 

A friend owns a wood and were asked to fell a diseased beech by the footpath by the council on safety grounds which they did. Surprised to see little evidence of felling recently by canals.  

A large majority of the canal side trees are probably not CRT owned and of those landowners who are actively managing Ash dieback canal side trees are almost certainly identified as very low risk, I know to someone who has a bit of Ash drop on their boat this will be no comfort but landowners are concentrating on Highway and similar areas, canals are very low down the priority list.

 

I would hope CRT are being more proactive for their own trees but even they will risk zone areas and will probably address highway and high use areas first.

 

[Stroudwater1]

1 hour ago, tree monkey said:

A large majority of the canal side trees are probably not CRT owned and of those landowners who are actively managing Ash dieback canal side trees are almost certainly identified as very low risk, I know to someone who has a bit of Ash drop on their boat this will be no comfort but landowners are concentrating on Highway and similar areas, canals are very low down the priority list.

 

I would hope CRT are being more proactive for their own trees but even they will risk zone areas and will probably address highway and high use areas first.

 

Thanks, good to know. Thankfully the Shroppie cuttings didn’t seem too full of Ash but there did seem a lot going on in other areas, some eventually will look very different 😢. 
 

Wont some branches be more than a bit in terms of weight though? I’m not sure that CRT and active management go together much sadly. The worst would be something nasty to happen and the inevitable overreaction by lopping the lot☹️ 

[tree monkey]

8 minutes ago, Stroudwater1 said:

Thanks, good to know. Thankfully the Shroppie cuttings didn’t seem too full of Ash but there did seem a lot going on in other areas, some eventually will look very different 😢. 
 

Wont some branches be more than a bit in terms of weight though? I’m not sure that CRT and active management go together much sadly. The worst would be something nasty to happen and the inevitable overreaction by lopping the lot☹️ 

ADB so far seems to be fairly slow in its action, or at least the trees hang on for a few years and tend to crumble rather than fail catastrophically, that's not to say they won't but I haven't seen any yet.

 

It's a bit of a mess that's for sure, the problem we have is we are very low down on the priority list, the main drive has to be road and rail

 

You are right though safety aside the landscape will look very different in a few years, Ash will never go away but it will be a fair few years before we see mature Ash common in the landscape again

[koukouvagia]

I remember a good few years back that a tree fell on a hire boat below Stoke Hammond lock, killing one of the crew.  I can't remember the details or find any record online, but I know there was a flurry of tree pruning by BW along that stretch shortly afterwards.

[GUMPY]

20 hours ago, blackrose said:

I reported today's incident to the EA because that great big branch is just hanging there waiting to fall on a passing boat. It very nearly happened today.

 

The bloke from the EA told me that the environment agency is not the navigation authority for the River Nene in Northampton and said that I should speak to the local council. I tried to politely correct him but he wasn't having any of it. He asked me where I got the information to say that the EA were the navigation authority so I said that I paid my licence fee to the EA. He replied that all boats on any waterway in the UK had to have an EA licence! I corrected him again but he just wasn't listening. 

 

In the end I lost patience and said that if the EA weren't the navigation authority for the Nene in my area could they please return my licence fee!

 

There are some complete morons working for the EA. 

I have reported trees that block navigation to the EA  via twitter adding in their twitter account  https://twitter.com/Ang_WaterwaysEA? , I always include the what3words location so they know where  it is . Usually get a reply within an hour and to the best of my knowledge they deal with it.

 

 

 

 

[CIEL]

So I wonder whether they successfully appointed a River Inspector for this length?

https://environmentagencyjobs.tal.net/vx/mobile-0/appcentre-1/brand-2/candidate/so/pm/1/pl/1/opp/19168-River-Inspector-Navigation-Officer-19168/en-GB 

Applications closed  05/09/2021.

 

[Mike Todd]

5 hours ago, Tracy D'arth said:

Its all an act of god if you so believe.

By whom?

[Troyboy]

3 hours ago, CIEL said:

So I wonder whether they successfully appointed a River Inspector for this length?

https://environmentagencyjobs.tal.net/vx/mobile-0/appcentre-1/brand-2/candidate/so/pm/1/pl/1/opp/19168-River-Inspector-Navigation-Officer-19168/en-GB 

Applications closed  05/09/2021.

 

I think they have as I was speaking to an EA employee yesterday who mentioned that a new member of staff had been appointed and was going to visit Middle Nene Cruising Club to introduce himself to the harbourmaster. 

[PaulJ]

4 hours ago, CIEL said:

So I wonder whether they successfully appointed a River Inspector for this length?

https://environmentagencyjobs.tal.net/vx/mobile-0/appcentre-1/brand-2/candidate/so/pm/1/pl/1/opp/19168-River-Inspector-Navigation-Officer-19168/en-GB 

Applications closed  05/09/2021.

 

 

1 hour ago, Troyboy said:

I think they have as I was speaking to an EA employee yesterday who mentioned that a new member of staff had been appointed and was going to visit Middle Nene Cruising Club to introduce himself to the harbourmaster. 

 

[blackrose]

On 11/07/2022 at 20:50, frangar said:

Do the EA have a formal complaints procedure because if so that needs putting on one…all joking aside someone could be seriously injured thanks to that idiots attitude….plus the rest of the info which is downright wrong. It might be a bit of grief for you but I’d raise the complaint to the next level including time of call etc as those conversations are often recorded. 

 

I did make a complaint the same day.

[blackrose]

 

Could be, but I don't have the landowner's phone number so I was simply reporting the incident to the EA so that they could make the necessary calls in order that passing boaters aren't killed when that huge branch does come down. It seems unlikely to fall just as a boat is passing underneath but I witnessed in very nearly coming down right on top of a plastic cruiser. Had it not stopped halfway down the tree I think they could have been seriously injured or killed.

On 12/07/2022 at 06:30, frangar said:

If it could injure someone on EA land/water then I would hope they might at least contact the landlord of the land the tree is on once they have been informed of a incident if only to protect their own arse. 

 

Exactly.

On 12/07/2022 at 09:55, MtB said:

 

 

Indeed, it would be the decent thing to do. But I was commenting on who, if anyone, might carry legal responsibility. 

 

Lets imagine the partially fallen tree does later in fact, fall of a passing boat or person, and it is damaged and/or they are injured or killed. Who gets sued, and d for what? 

 

Well, since the EA has been informed by me, if they do nothing then it seems likely that they would bear some legal responsibility.

[blackrose]

On 11/07/2022 at 21:09, CIEL said:

 

 

That's the place. If you are travelling downstream and have just exited Lilford lock, once you pass under the road bridge stay over to the right. Going upstream, stay over to the left as you approach the bridge. The branch is very heavy and just hanging there waiting to fall (it's just downstream of the bridge).

Edited July 16, 2022 by blackrose

[CIEL]

Instantly recognised from your photo that just catches the relatively recently replaced ornate balustrade on the bridge.  It will need a few years to weather in and not look quite so starkly new!

Chris

[David Mack]

7 hours ago, blackrose said:

Could be, but I don't have the landowner's phone number so I was simply reporting the incident to the EA

And you think the EA do have the phone number of all the riparian owners along their rivers?

[MtB]

33 minutes ago, David Mack said:

And you think the EA do have the phone number of all the riparian owners along their rivers?

 

 

And more particularly, being a corporate organisation rather than a human bean, does the EA give a monkey's chuff about a "huge branch" that might fall on a boat but probably won't?

[Peugeot 106]

Willow trunk approx 18” dia x 20’ tall just crashed down without warning on the opposite bank. Missed all boats. Couldn’t stand the heat. Last time I saw this was on the Llangollen 2 years ago. It’s not that rare and I won’t be buying a lottery ticket!