Appreciation post: The day a storm made me rethink every tree I've ever climbed

We got called out after that big windstorm hit Cedar Rapids last week, a job to clear a massive white oak that had split right down the middle over a driveway. The usual rush was there, but what got me was the inside of the trunk. It was hollow, but not in the normal way. The decay pattern was like a perfect spiral, almost beautiful, showing years of slow fungus work we'd missed from the outside. My ground guy just stared up and said, 'That thing was a time bomb, Casey.' It wasn't just another removal. It was a full lesson in how a tree can look solid from the ground but be holding its breath. Made me pull out the resistograph on three other 'healthy' trees on that property, and two of them were bad. How often do you guys double-check your visual assessments after something like that?