Timber! Downed tree smashes multiple cars on Independence Avenue

If a tree falls and no one is around to hear it, can it still wreck your car?

On the morning of March 21, a massive London Plane tree came down on the roof of two cars parked along Independence Avenue, leaving one Kia in particularly rough shape. The vehicle’s shattered windshield caved in and a side-view mirror was left hanging by a string.

“We were in our apartment and there was a loud bang,” Caitlin Silva expressed, owner of the Kia. “All I thought was, ‘don’t tell me that’s my car.’”

Silva purchased the car two years ago.

Cecily McNickle said she heard the tree fall from her apartment on the corner of Independence Ave. and W. 240^th St at 8:41 a.m.

“When I was taking my son to school, we saw the FDNY there with chainsaws removing the tree,” she described.

The debris was cleared off the road by 9:40 a.m., according to the FDNY, after which Elquin Tree Service Inc. sawed the thick branches into stumps and sent them through a woodchipper.

Typically, the New York City Parks Department takes charge of clearing downed trees in public spaces. But the Parks Department told the Press it’s on Briar Hill management to clean up the aftermath, as the roots were growing on private property.

“I’m not a tree expert, but it doesn’t look too safe,” Vera Vermann said of a separate nearby tree growing at a nearly 45-degree angle. “Seeing that, it’s not surprising to me that it fell. They need to maintain this area or this is going to happen again.”

Last month, a tree collapsed on Manhattan College Parkway after a powerful storm swept through the area, crushing cars and motorcycles. In 2022, a 59-year-old woman was killed by a falling tree while in a Riverdale pool.

The management company of the property is looking into the incident.