NEW ORLEANS — Two live oak trees at City Park that were heavily damaged during Monday's heavy rains are currently being taken down.
Chris Maitre, City Park Conservancy Chief Operations Officer, said one oak tree about 10 feet up from its base snapped off and half and fell into another oak tree, splitting that second oak tree right down the middle.
Maitre estimates that the trees were about 300 years old.
"Is a terrible loss for us here in the park, We openly weeped about it, and we were very hard-pressed to really not take them out because of the safety issues. They have been around and suffered many other weather events. But a combination of lightning strikes on the one tree that broke off at its base, as well as termite damage and the quick water absorption following a significant drought as we've been having, which has resulted in the fire burn, obviously the burn ban, it was an abundance of caution that we needed to take these live oaks," Maitre said.
► Get breaking news from your neighborhood delivered directly to you by downloading the new FREE WWL-TV News app now in the IOS App Store or Google Play.