Falling Tree Kills Exeter Woman

Currently there are still two "Danger of Death" severe flood warnings in force for South West England. Still the one at Helston, plus another at Lostwithiel. In addition there are 74 red flood warnings, and 61 amber alerts.

Sadly a woman has been killed here in Exeter by a falling tree.  According to This Is Exeter:

Police have confirmed that a woman thought to be in her early 20's has died after being hit by a fallen tree in Exeter.

At around 11.50pm on Saturday night, 24 November 2012 police received a report of a tree that had fallen on Western Way, near to junction with Barnfield Road in Exeter. The tree was reported to have landed on or near to three people.

On police arrival at the scene three casualties were confirmed. One person was trapped and receiving treatment. They were being described as seriously injured. Two others who were clear from the tree were also receiving treatment.

The tree was described as a very large spruce tree which had come down across a wall into the roadway.

The seriously injured female casualty was taken to hospital. A short time later she was declared deceased by medical staff.

Our heartfelt condolences to the families involved in this tragedy.

According to This Is Exeter once more:

The RNLI’s south west Flood Rescue Team have tonight (Saturday 24 November) been tasked to assist the emergency services in Exeter, Devon.

The team that’s made up of RNLI lifeboat crew volunteers, who are trained in flood rescue techniques, will be responding to the city with two inshore lifeboats.

I'm a long time supporter of the Royal National Lifeboat Institution, but I have to admit I never expected their extraordinarily brave volunteers to take the "inshore" part of their watercraft's name quite so literally.  Meanwhile here in the countryside just outside Exeter we have already had over 4 inches of rain in November 2012. Here's what the centre of the city looked like very recently: