Well, in a nutshell here it is. I parked my scout on the outside of an old landing that was all grown over by waw myrtle. My plan was to lay a redwood on the landing. It stood 60 feet below the landing on a steep slope. For the steepness of the slope I knew I would have to use a reference mark to find the lay to put this tree on the landing. I stood on the edge of it looking down at the tree and then drew a line of sight to the skyline. I found a top of a redwood on the far side of the landing I figured would be good to sight in the undercut. Oops
So I went down to the tree and looked up the slope and found the top, but it wasn't the top I figured. Second growth tops all look the same, dammit.
So I fell the tree up slope to lay on the landing. The butt rocked up in the over thirty feet. The tree save out good. right where I sighted the undercut,, I was happy. alright!
I climbed up the slope, got on the tree to plug my tape into the butt. Now here's the good part. The landing having been over grown I could not see that the tree laid off gunn by about 45 degrees. Not until I walked the tape out to make a log. Then I looked up and seen the top I wanted to gunn the tree to was not where the tree landed.
I then realize this tree I had just fell had crossed the log road. I didn't even think of my truck. I was more worried about having topped the tree in the road and causing even bigger problems.
I run out the tree so fast, to see what I did, that I forgot to unplug my tape. Snapped it off. When I broke through the brush of that overgrown landing and found the top of this tree I had just fell broke right over my Scout. Damn!
Now the battery was crushed and causing an electrical fire. So I ripped the hood off to disconnect the battery cables. I could do that because the impact broke the hinges. Kind of handy. I put out the electrical fire.
Windshield crushed and cab I could still dive the rig out of there and all the way home. 75 miles no windshield and the steering wheel cocked a near horizontal.
I think a compass could have come in handy on that one.