Storm Eunice hit the South of England on Friday 18 February 2022, with winds of up to 122 mph – a provisional record for England. During the following weekend, I visited some local parks to gauge the extent of damage it had left behind.
In Gunnersbury Park, two large trees had fallen across the path that forms the Parkrun course. Needless to say that the Saturday 19 February event had to be cancelled.
Both the Gunnersbury Park trees had been uprooted by the storm. But, in Walpole Park, a majestic Cedar of Lebanon had been split in half, the top part of the tree crashing into a walled garden.
It was sad to see these fallen trees but, judging by the news reports of £360 million worth of damage in the U.K., the parks in my part of London seem to have escaped fairly lightly.