A man has died after a tree fell onto a vehicle in Finchley, north London, on Sunday afternoon.
London Ambulance Service crews were called at 12.29pm on Sunday 25 October to reports of an incident near Abercorn Road. Despite the efforts of paramedics at the scene, the man was pronounced dead there.
The service sent ambulance crews, incident response officers and paramedics from its hazardous area response team (HART) to the scene, and dispatched a trauma team from London’s Air Ambulance.
“Very sadly, despite the best efforts of our crews, a man was pronounced dead at the scene,” a London Ambulance Service spokesperson said.
Nether Street was reported blocked in both directions between Abercorn Road and Crescent Road following the incident earlier in the afternoon. No diversion route was published alongside the closure.
Reports on social media said a tree had fallen onto a vehicle while a person was inside. That detail has not been confirmed by the emergency services in their published statement, and it has not been stated whether anyone else was in the vehicle.
The man has not been named, and no age has been given. No statement from the police about the incident has been published, and no cause for the tree falling has been stated. No other injuries have been reported, and no time for the road reopening has been given.
The closure covers the stretch of Nether Street between its junctions with Abercorn Road and Crescent Road, in Finchley, in the London Borough of Barnet. The road is a residential street, and the closure will have disrupted journeys through the area on Sunday afternoon.
HART paramedics are specially trained to work in hazardous or complex environments, and are sent to incidents where conditions may make ordinary ambulance access difficult or dangerous. London’s Air Ambulance trauma teams work alongside ambulance crews at serious incidents across the capital, bringing hospital-level emergency care to the scene.
In general, when someone dies suddenly and unexpectedly, the death is referred to the coroner, whose role is to establish the identity of the person who died and how they died. That process is separate from any investigation by the emergency services into the circumstances of an incident.
When a death is confirmed at the scene, paramedics record the time and circumstances, and the body remains in place until the coroner’s officers and, where necessary, police have completed their initial work. That is why roads around a fatal incident are often closed for some time after the emergency response itself has ended.
Road closures after serious incidents serve two purposes: they give emergency crews room to work safely, and they preserve the scene while the circumstances are established. Closures of this kind can last for hours, and no reopening time is normally given until the scene has been cleared.
Trees on public highways are normally maintained by the local council, which carries out inspections and pruning as part of its highways work. Residents who believe a street tree is dead, damaged or dangerous can report it to their council, which can then arrange an inspection. Nothing has been stated about the condition or ownership of the tree involved in the Finchley incident, or about whether it had previously been reported.
Finchley has seen a busy weekend on the roads. Burnt Oak Tube station is to shut for a fortnight this half-term for step-free access works, while floodlit padel courts at Finchley Golf Club are among the latest Barnet planning applications. Earlier on Sunday, police restricted protests near the JW3 centre on Finchley Road for the day.
Further details about the Finchley incident, including the identity of the man and the circumstances of the tree falling, have not yet been released. This article will be updated if the emergency services publish more information.
