“Danger Trees” in Central Appalachian Forests of the United States: An Assessment of Their Frequency of Occurrence

Abstract

Logging accident statistics and evidence provided by case studies suggest that hazardous tree conditions account for many falling-object accidents in the United States. However, despite the Occupational Safety and Health Administration’s recently released comprehensive logging standard, the definition of “safe working conditions” in the context of the natural forest environment is still unclear. The OSHA standard has attempted to describe tree conditions that it considers potentially hazardous. Several of these conditions, especially those related to the condition of root systems, are difficult to evaluate during large-scale inventories. Other conditions (e.g., broken or dead tree branches and tops) are more practically and objectively assessed. This research has shown that, in the Central Appalachian region, approximately 20 trees per acre fall into one of the following six categories: alive with broken tops, alive with intact dead tops, dead with intact tops, dead with broken tops, snags with intact tops, or snags with broken tops. Approximately two-thirds of these “danger trees” were snags. In addition, inspection of the results suggests some consistency in trees per acre in each condition class among the states included in the study.