A Kootenay woman is lucky to be alive after this week’s windstorm brought two trees down onto her home in Shoreares, B.C.
Pamala DeRosa was in bed when she heard an extremely loud bang and her intuition told her she needed to get out of the house.
DeRosa said she saw the first tree come crashing down onto the building, tearing the power lines off the house, sending out sparks, and hitting her bedroom.
“If I were like a minute slower I would have been in the room when the tree came down,” DeRosa said.
Images of the damage show the house essentially cut in half by the falling tree.
She and her dog got in her car and fled down the road.
DeRosa called 911 and waited out the storm in a nearby clearing.
In total, DeRosa estimates around 40 trees came down in the area, including another tree that hit a second unoccupied bedroom in her house.
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DeRosa’s neighbour, who also fled the storm, said the heavy winds knocked out so many trees it has dramatically changed the area.
Julie Lamacraft said what was once a dark, heavily forested area with no view of the valley now has an open sky and a valley view.
“I’ve never seen a whole forest come down,” Lamacraft said.
DeRosa said her home is now a write-off.
“People have been telling me how lucky I am and I don’t think that the gravity of the situation’s really hit me. I see the trees. I see the carnage and it hasn’t quite hit me yet,” she said.
“My dad was crying…seeing our house, and knowing I was in there, and knowing that my decision to leave saved my life.”
Wednesday morning’s windstorm left more than 100,000 people across British Columbia without power.
– with files from Sarah MacDonald and Jules Knox