Man Dead in Excavating Accident
Contractor crushed by oak tree which fell on his backhoe

By Kenneth C. Rossignol

ST. MARY'S TODAY

PARK HALL --- A local family suffered a stunning loss not far from their home on Thursday when George Robert Adams, 50, was killed while operating a excavating loader attempting to push over an oak tree when the tree reversed direction and crushed him in the cab of his machine.
Maryland State Police Trooper First Class Mark McLean reports that Adams was working at the rear of a home on Gilliam Driver to remove a large oak tree by digging out around the base of the tree and then using the arm of the loader to push the tree over.
“Instead the tree shifted and followed back against the loader arm and fell back on the machine, crushing Mr. Adams,” said McLean.
The incident took place at 2:48 p.m., said Sgt. Gary Willis.
McLean reports that the Bay District Volunteer Fire Department attempted to cut the tree off of the backhoe but due to the massive size of the tree was unable to make quick work of the removal.
Thus Blazer Construction volunteered the use of a large machine to lift the tree off of the cab of the loader, giving Bay District firefighters access to the cab to be able to cut away the metal to remove Adams, who had been pronounced dead.
Adams was a co-owner of Adams Brothers Construction and had been in the business of excavation for at least 25 years. The family has recently developed an upscale housing neighborhood on family-owned property in Park Hall.
The use of excavating machines to give a shove to tree removal is generally a routine operation and the death of Adams in operating a backhoe is equally rare.
Fatalities in St. Mary’s County due to falling trees and limbs is a cause of death dating back to colonial times.
Referred to as “widow makers” in local vernacular, the sudden dropping of tree limbs on a day of nice weather has been taking its toll on life.
Trees become unstable during storms such as the one, which swept through St. Mary’s County two weeks ago,
and on a clear day, without warning, branches or trees topple.
Thursday’s tragic event is a blow to one of the county’s largest and most respected families, said former States Attorney Walter B. Dorsey.
“I knew his father and him and his brother, they were hard-working people, people who were builders and made the county better and George was a real asset to the community,” said Dorsey.
Trooper McLean said that MOSHA, the state agency that regulates workplace safety, was on the scene and that when the tree fell it also damaged a portion of the roof of the yard of the home where the tree was being removed.