Falling tree kills man

COOLIN — A man was killed and a woman was seriously injured Friday when a large tree toppled onto their pickup truck during the fierce windstorm that raked Priest Lake.

Idaho State Police said that Gary E. Bierwagen, 66, of Walla Walla, Wash., was killed when the tree struck his 2007 Toyota Tundra while he was traveling down a private driveway on Pinto Point Road.

The identities of the other victims or their hometowns was not immediately available late Friday.

Preliminary reports indicated that a Tundra containing five people was being driven down East Pinto Point Road when the tree fell onto the vehicle. The occupants of the vehicle had to be extricated, said Bonner County EMS spokesman Bob Abbott.

“Access was exceedingly difficult for rescuers,” said Abbott, referring to the scores of blown-down trees that blocked roadways.

There were reports that rescuers had to cut their way into the area where the truck was, although Abbott said he did not know that for a fact.

The woman who survived was flown by Life Flight to an undisclosed hospital. Three others, reportedly children, were driven to undisclosed hospitals with injuries that were not life-threatening, said Abbott.

There were indications that occupants of the truck were a family, but it could not be immediately confirmed.

Commissioner Mike Nielsen, a Priest Lake resident, said hundreds of trees were blown down in the Highway 57 corridor.

“We got hit really hard here at Priest Lake,” Nielsen said.

The Cavanaugh Bay-Coolin Fire District, Priest Lake Ambulance, Bonner EMS, Idaho Department of Lands, Idaho State Police and Bonner County sheriff’s deputies responded to the call on East Pinto Point Road.