No matter how carefully a consultant inspects your large trees for hazard conditions, damage may still occur. In fierce storms, we throw away the books. You may as well roll dice rather than to guarantee a tree's invulnerability against the forces of nature.

If you or your neighbors lose large trees, make sure to have them examined for disease symptoms, which may have made them more susceptible to failure. More importantly, take extra care to examine trees still standing nearby. Most importantly, take the time to have inspections carried out before you decide to have all remaining large trees cut down.

If you have trees that sustained damage but still stand, hire an arborist to climb and inspect damaged parts. Then, armed with good advice from a competent professional, you can make an informed decision to retain and fix or to remove the damaged trees.

In the Puget Sound region, particularly in the metropolitan Seattle area, mudslides and trees are inextricably related. Spirited debates between well-qualified experts in arboriculture, forestry, soils engineering, and geology go back and forth on the relative benefits or liabilities of trees to slopes.

Several areas of general consensus require mentioning:

- saturated soil (mud) on a slope steeper than 40% will usually slide, unless stabilized either by structures or by vegetation, namely roots, but in extreme cases, even vegetation does not and cannot hold back a massive landslide.

If tree roots cannot penetrate hardpan, which lies beneath topsoil, then at some point water in over¬saturated soil will lubricate the interface between the hardpan and the soil, and the soil will slide.

Saturated soil on hillsides results from some disturbance which alters established surface and/or subterranean drainage patterns. Some common causes of drainage disturbance include:

• poor development site practices at the top of a hill;
• tree and vegetation removal;
• neglected maintenance of drainage facilities for streets and buildings at top of slope.

It is important to note that cleared slopes without benefit of erosion protection seem more inclined to fail than do well forested hillsides with healthy understory vegetation. Despite the undeniable fact that large, unstable trees in poor condition on hills can cause landslides. In general it is better to leave trees and vegetation on hillsides.

If your property sustains slide damage, then the following steps must be taken:

• Remove remaining perched mud from the slope.
• Determine the cause of over saturation (the source of water) and correct it:
• by capturing it in a drainage system and taking it off site;
• by redirection and dispersal at lower rates.
• Cover exposed soil (the "slide scar") with erosion protection fabric.
• Install structural "catchment" watts.

As appropriate:

• Inspect all large trees near or on the sear; remove or protect as needed.
• Do not rely solely on the advice of a soils expert or an arborist; find professionals from each discipline who can work together and ask them to provide a combined slide restoration plan.

Other emergencies which qualify as disaster can include:

• trespass tree cutting for view or for timber theft
• vandalism
• automobile or excavation equipment damage
• herbicide accidents
• industrial pollution

In all such cases, you will require the services of a well-qualified ISA / ASCA consultant and probably an attorney. Of the five mentioned above, the trespass tree cutting can and often does lead to further complications, especially when such cutting occurs on a hillside. Trespass cutting for view improvement is an all-too-common occurrence on Puget Sound slopes.

Timber theft in suburban and rural areas can also result in long-term damage to slopes.