CLEVELAND — In response to a public records request, the city of Cleveland on Tuesday released its workplace accident report from a July 14 incident that resulted in the death of city arborist Sean Hudson.
Hudson died after a tree landed on him while he was performing tree work at the Cleveland Cultural Gardens.
The report indicates that two other city arborists, Curtis Wells and Raymond Nelson, witnessed the incident.
The two workers said in the report that Hudson was grabbing the handle of a chainsaw at the time of the incident. Both workers said that the chainsaw was stuck in the tree when Hudson was grabbing the chainsaw.
“During a final cut on an oak tree, the chainsaw got stuck,” Nelson wrote in a report to supervisors. “While trying to free the saw, the trunk came loose and caught Sean’s arm and rolled on him. I immediately moved the trunk off him with the log trunk.”
Hudson had been an arborist for the city since 2017.
“Sean was a valued and dedicated employee, held in the highest regard by his co-workers. He was a husband, father and friend who will be missed,” Cleveland Mayor Frank Jackson said at the time of the incident.
A National Institutes of Health study indicates these kinds of incidents are rare. During a period from 1985-2007, there were 45 fatalities throughout the U.S. involving tree care operations. Of those, nine involved the tree falling on a worker.
