Grubs and gusts knock huge oak onto van and truck on Jamaicaway

A grub-infested oak toppled onto the Jamaicaway in Saturday's gusty winds, smashing the windshield of a van and hitting a truck.

"The tree blew down from the wind," said District Fire Chief Steve Rushton.

Two people in the van were taken to a hospital for evaluation, Rushton said. The driver of the truck, Adam Siegel, was unharmed.

"I heard a large 'crack!'" said Siegel, who was in the left-hand  lane heading north along the Jamaicaway. He swerved right and the tree hit the driver's side of the truck, damaging the suspension.

Siegel, from the North End, was travelling between Roslindale and Cambridge.

"It could have been a lot worse," he said.

Siegel did not see what happened to the van in the moment he swerved to avoid the tree.

The windshield and front of the Toyota Sienna van took the brunt of the force of the tree's fall.

Firefighters from the nearby Jamaica Plain station put their specialized technical rescue training and equipment to work in quickly clearing the large trunk from the roadway. Most firetrucks do not have the heavy-duty winch the firefighters used.

The two people in the van and Siegel were able to get out of their vehicles themselves before rescue units arrived, Rushton said.

The remaining stump of the oak shows massive infestation by grubs. The trunk, which wound up across the street after firefighters winched it off the road, was also hollowed out.

[Editor's note: The original headline mistakenly said a van and car were struck by the tree.]