Image copyright Calaveras Big Trees State Park Image caption The giant sequoia, which was carved into a living tunnel over a century ago, has fallen

Storms in California have toppled one of America's most famous trees - the Pioneer Cabin Tree.

The giant sequoia was known for having a hole cut through its trunk - big enough for a car to drive through.

The tree, estimated to be more than 1,000-years-old, was felled by the strongest storm to have hit the area in more than a decade.

California and Nevada have been hit by unusually high rainfall levels, leading to flooding and falling trees.

Image copyright Facebook

The Calaveras Big Trees Association first reported that the drive-through Pioneer Cabin Tree - carved 137 years ago - was no more.

The storm was "just too much for it", the group wrote in a Facebook post that has drawn nearly 2,000 comments.

"Many memories were created under this tree," one read. "They will remain good memories."

Others pointed out that the tree might have survived for longer if a tunnel had not been carved into it.

"You can't cut a hole in a tree like this and expect it to live," said one comment.

"This hole always bothered me so much. Why not just drive around it?"

Park volunteer Jim Allday said the sequoia, also known as the Tunnel Tree, shattered as it hit the ground.

"We lost an old friend today," he wrote in a social media post.

Giant sequoia are closely related to the redwood tree, which is considered the tallest tree species on earth, reaching 250ft (76 metres).

They can only grow naturally in the groves of California's Sierra Nevada mountains.

Image copyright New York Public Library Image caption A 1899 stereograph shows the Pioneer Cabin tree

The tree fell as parts of California and Nevada were drenched by a seasonal weather system known as the Pineapple Express.

Not to be confused with the Seth Rogen movie of the same name, the Pineapple Express is an "atmospheric river" that extends across the Pacific from Hawaii to the US West Coast, meteorologists say.

"This is a serious flood situation," the National Weather Service said in a special flood statement late Sunday night after the Russian River in California and the Truckee River in Nevada burst their banks.

Hundreds of people have been forced to flee their homes in Northern California and Nevada as water levels rise, and avalanches and mudslides close roads.</s>The Pioneer Cabin Tree, more popularly known as the Tunnel Tree and located in the Sierra Nevada region of California, has toppled over during a storm on Sunday. The Pioneer Cabin Tree is thought to have been at least 1,000-years-old and was in the Calaveras County area of California. The Tunnel Tree was a very special attraction at the Calaveras Big Trees State Park.

On Sunday, the Calaveras Big Trees Association posted on Facebook that the recent storm had been too much for the Tunnel Tree.

Giant sequoias are the world’s largest trees, according to Buzzfeed, and are only found on in the Sierra Nevada Mountains along the western slopes. These sequoias can reach 325 feet high and can live for 3,000 years, as NPR reports.

The Pioneer Cabin Tree was hollowed in the 1880s so that at one point cars were able to drive through it, but most recently you could only access the Tunnel Tree by traveling along a hiking trail.

The Tunnel Tree is reported to have fallen on Sunday at 2 p.m. Jim Allday, a volunteer in the area, was busy working on Sunday afternoon when he noticed that the trail leading to the Pioneer Cabin Tree had been washed out and that was when he spotted the tree lying on the ground.

“When I went out there Sunday afternoon, the trail was literally a river, the trail is washed out. I could see the tree on the ground, it looked like it was laying in a pond or lake with a river running through it. People are in absolute shock. The shame of it is that the history of the park is tied into this tree quite a bit. The inside of the Cabin Tree was covered with etchings from the 1800s. Those are lost now.”

The tree fell as an extremely powerful storm struck Northern California with both rain and snow and forecasters were warning residents to expect the worst flooding that had been seen in over a decade. Yosemite National Park was also closed, as winds approaching 100 mph were being reported in the region near the crest of the mountains.

The Tunnel Tree was one of several sequoia trees with tunnels through them. Yosemite National Park’s Wawona Tree may have been one of the most famous of these, but toppled over during a winter storm in 1969 after having stood for 88 summers. The Wawona Tree was estimated to have been 2,100-years-old.

The National Park Service states that the tunnel was created through the Wawona Tree in 1881 as a local tourist attraction and that it was was the second sequoia to be tunneled through. They also say, however, that tunnel trees were once a popular part of national parks in the early days, but that natural sequoias standing tall and healthy are more valuable to the world now.

After the Tunnel Tree’s death was announced on the Facebook post by the Calaveras Big Trees Association, scores of people turned the page into a memorial, with photographs and memorable stories about the Pioneer Cabin Tree. One poster wrote, “A sad day! There is nothing more impressive on this earth than nature and we lost a long standing reminder of this. I visited the Sequoia trees a couple of years ago and still am overwhelmed when I think of them.”

Another poster showed readers a photograph of the Tunnel Tree which was taken between 1864-1874 before the tree had been tunneled through.

Have you visited the Pioneer Cabin Tree before and what memories do you have of the Tunnel Tree?</s>A famed giant sequoia hollowed out so cars could drive through its trunk has met its end — toppled by the rains that lashed California over the weekend.

"The Pioneer Cabin tree has fallen!" the Calaveras Big Trees Association said on Facebook. "This iconic and still living tree — the tunnel tree — enchanted many visitors. The storm was just too much for it."

The tree's exact age and height were not immediately available, but sequoias can measure their ages in millennia and grow taller than 100 yards, or more than the length of a football field. They are the tallest trees in the world, according to Mario D. Vaden, a tree expert who has worked with the Save the Redwoods League in California.

Photos show the sequoia splintered on impact. If the question is whether a tree falling in the forest makes a noise, this one probably did.

The Pioneer Cabin Tree was in Calaveras Big Trees State Park, 100 miles southeast of Sacramento. Its trunk was hollowed out in the 1880s to compete with similar trees in Yosemite National Park, perhaps 50 miles further to the southeast, as the crow flies.

At first, only hikers passed through the Pioneer Cabin Tree. Then cars, once they were invented, were allowed. But more recently, passage was again limited to pedestrians only.

People shared decades of memories of the tree on the Calaveras Big Trees Association's Facebook page.

And another poster, Gerogie Hensely, wrote, "I have pictures of my folks and their car driving through this tree when I was a kid and I'm now 78 years old."

The trees are said to live as as long as 3,000 years. The normal cause of death is toppling by storm.</s>Pioneer Cabin Tree, an iconic giant sequoia in California’s Calaveras Big Trees State Park, was toppled during a massive storm that swept through the state on Sunday. “The storm was just too much for it,” the Calaveras Big Trees Association wrote on Facebook along with images of the fallen giant taken by park volunteer Jim Allday: His wife, park volunteer Joan Allday, told SFGate that the tree was in bad shape before the storm hit. “It was barely alive, there was one branch alive at the top,” she was quoted as saying. “But it was very brittle and starting to lift.” It’s not clear how old the tree was, but other great sequoias in the park are more than 1,200 years old. The great tree with its 32-foot diameter was already a popular photo stop even before the tunnel was carved into it, as 19th-century images show: Transcendental Graphics via Getty Images According to the American Park Network’s OhRanger.com website, the tree was hollowed out in the 1880s to compete with a similar tree in Yosemite National Park, which had become a popular tourist destination. At the time, the Pioneer Cabin Tree was part of a privately owned resort, Redwood Hikes stated. That tunnel won the tree attention, and for a time cars could even drive through it. However, the destruction of the trunk damaged the tree forever. “Because of the huge cut, this tree can no longer support the growth of a top, which you can see lying on the ground if you walk through the tunnel,” a park brochure notes. “The opening also has reduced the ability of the tree to resist fire.” The great sequoias, cousins to the coastal redwoods, are the largest trees in the world by volume and can live up to 3,000 years old.</s>A powerful winter storm in California has brought down an ancient tree, carved into a living tunnel more than a century ago.

The "Pioneer Cabin Tree" sequoia, in Calaveras Big Trees State Park, saw horses and cars pass through it over the years. More recently, only hikers were allowed to walk through the massive tree.

Over the weekend, a powerful winter storm slammed into California and Nevada, prompting flooding and mudslides in some regions. The Associated Press reports it might be the biggest storm to hit the region in more than a decade.

On Sunday, a volunteer at the state park reported that Pioneer Cabin had not survived.

"The storm was just too much for it," the Calaveras Big Tree Association wrote on Facebook.

It's unclear exactly how old the tree was, but The Los Angeles Times reports that the trees in the state park are estimated to be more than 1,000 years old. Sequoias can live for more than 3,000 years.

The iconic tree was one of just a few tunneled-through sequoias in California. The most famous was the Wawona Tree, in Yosemite National Park; it fell during a winter storm in 1969 at an estimated age of 2,100 years. The other remaining sequoia tunnels are dead or consist of logs on their side, the Forest Service says.

However, there are still three coastal redwoods (taller and more slender than sequoias) with tunnels cut through them. They're all operated by private companies, the Forest Service says, and still allow cars to drive through — one appeared in a recent Geico ad.

SFGate.com spoke to Jim Allday, the volunteer who reported Pioneer Cabin's demise. He told the website that the tree "shattered" when it hit the ground on Sunday afternoon, and that people had walked through it as recently as that morning.

Local flooding might have been the reason the tree fell, SFGate reports:



" 'When I went out there [Sunday afternoon], the trail was literally a river, the trail is washed out,' Allday said. 'I could see the tree on the ground, it looked like it was laying in a pond or lake with a river running through it.' " "The tree had been among the most popular features of the state park since the late 1800s. The tunnel had graffiti dating to the 1800s, when visitors were encouraged to etch their names into the bark. "Joan Allday, wife of Jim Allday and also a volunteer at the park, said the tree had been weakening and leaning severely to one side for several years. " 'It was barely alive, there was one branch alive at the top,' she said. 'But it was very brittle and starting to lift.' "



Tunnel trees were created in the 19th century to promote parks and inspire tourism. But cutting a tunnel through a living sequoia, of course, damages the tree.

"Tunnel trees had their time and place in the early history of our national parks," the National Park Service has written. "But today sequoias which are standing healthy and whole are worth far more."</s>You know that old adage, "If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound"? Well yesterday an iconic tree in California's Calaveras Big Trees State Park fell and left a resounding sadness for those who had the chance to visit.

The Pioneer Cabin Tree was hollowed out at the base of the trunk in the late 1800s to create a tunnel that thousands of visitors have since walked through. The architects were inspired by the Wawona Tree, a similar sequoia tree that stood at Yosemite National Park until 1969.

The remarkable tree still showed signs of life, but powerful storms in the area caused flooding that it could not withstand. Jim Allday, a volunteer at the park, told SF Gate that the tree fell down around 2 p.m. Sunday, and that it "shattered" on impact. "I could see the tree on the ground, it looked like it was laying in a pond or lake with a river running through it," he said.

While the age of the Pioneer Cabin Tree isn't clear, giant sequoias clan live more than 3,000 years, according to the National Park Service. Yosemite's Grizzly Giant is estimated to be 1,800 years old (give or take a few centuries).

RELATED: Top 10 most popular national parks in the US according to TripAdvisor

The Calaveras Big Trees Association, a nonprofit group, said it best in their Facebook tribute, "The iconic and still living tree...enchanted many visitors."

Indeed, many shared personal memories — and photos — of the tree. "I have a picture of my grandfather holding me in front of this tree back in early 50s," wrote one commenter on Facebook.

"This really made me sad," wrote another. "Yes, I cried. This tree is one of my precious memories when I was a kid. I have pictures of us in our van driving through this magnificent tree."

One woman shared her engagement photo featuring the tree. "My fiancé Scott just called me to let me know The Great Pioneer Cabin Tree is no more I am heart broken I love that tree!"

While this great wonder no longer stands, the National Park Service is host to many other sequoia gems, including the General Sherman Tree, which stands at 275 feet tall and has a diameter of 36 feet at the base.

While we've lost a great treasure in the Pioneer Cabin Tree, the inspiring and enchanting sites that remain are worth the trip!</s>The Pioneer Cabin Tree of Calaveras County, a giant sequoia with a car-sized hole in it, was felled by the weekend storm.

“The Pioneer Cabin tree has fallen!” said a post on the Calaveras Big Trees Association Facebook page. “This iconic and still living tree - the tunnel tree - enchanted many visitors. The storm was just too much for it.”

The Pioneer Cabin Tree was one of the most prominent features in the North Grove of the Sierra redwoods in Calaveras Big Trees State Park. The north grove has been popular with tourists since the 1800s.

When the Wawona Tunnel Tree in Yosemite was carved, the owners of the North Grove responded by doing the same to their tree. The Pioneer Cabin Tree was chosen for carving in the 1880s because of an extremely wide base.

The Calaveras tunnel tree was a hit. Initially cars were allowed to drive through, but in recent years it has been popular with park visitors who gather the family in the hole at the base of the tree and pose for a picture.

Some of those hikers who visited the tree posted pictures and comments on the Calaveras Big Trees Association Facebook page.

Oh no!!! I wanted to visit it one day,” said Mandy Glennie.

“What are you going to do with the tree? Will you cut it up and if so can a person get some of it? Would like to make some bowls and pens,” wrote Robert Mitchell.</s>There once was a giant old sequoia tree with a tunnel in the center so big you could drive a car through it. It sounds like a tall tale, but it was real. That tree, called the Pioneer Cabin Tree, fell over the weekend at California's Calaveras Big Trees State Park during a massive storm.

The tree stood out among the other giants due to a large tunnel carved through its base in the 1800s. A Library of Congress photo dating back to around 1886 shows a horse and carriage passing through the tree. In modern times, the park has only allowed foot traffic.

According to SFGate, the tree fell Sunday afternoon and shattered on impact. The powerful storm that took out the tree toppled many others, even halting interstate traffic south of San Francisco for more than an hour Sunday afternoon with a giant tree that fell across half the freeway.

Big Trees State Park visitors are now eulogizing the famous tree on the Calaveras Big Trees Association Facebook page. It had been a popular stop for family photo ops.

"I cannot believe one of California's icons will no longer be there for all of us. We have a photo with my dad about 1930 and then one of me about 1955 and then one with my hubby about 1980 or so. Sad days," Facebook user Wendy Craft writes.

According to the Calaveras Big Trees Association, the Pioneer Cabin Tree was still alive when it fell. Giant sequoias, also known as Sierra redwoods, can top 300 feet (91 meters) in height with diameters over 30 feet (9 meters). In the historic Pioneer Cabin photo, the tree sports a sign reading "diameter 32 feet."</s>One hundred and thirty-seven years ago, well before the Calaveras North Grove was purchased by the California State Park System and renamed the Calaveras Big Trees State Park, the land’s owners carved an enormous hole in the base of one of its sequoia trees. On Sunday, that tree fell.

This particular, 150-foot tall tree boasted a wide base — about 33 feet in diameter — which featured a large fire scar, an attribute that makes it easier to tunnel through. And that’s exactly what the owners created, a tunnel wide enough for an automobile to drive through.

The idea of passing through an enormous tree immediately proved to be a hit. Named the Pioneer’s Cabin Tree because the created chamber exposed the trunk’s hollowness, giving it a chimney-like appearance and calling to mind the image of an old log cabin, the tree quickly became one of the park’s most popular features.

Curious tourists would come from around the country to etch their names into its bark. Photos from the 1800s show visitors staring up into its great expanse, awe etched on their faces.

On Sunday at around 2 p.m., with names carved more than a century ago still prominent on its great trunk, the gargantuan tree fell to the ground after being pummelled by a particularly viscous winter storm.

“This iconic and still living tree — the tunnel tree — enchanted many visitors,” the Calaveras Big Tree Association wrote in a Facebook post. “The storm was just too much for it.”

Jim Allday, a park volunteer who was working at the time, told the Los Angeles Times the tree “shattered” when it hit the forest ground. Photos posted by the association appear to confirm this verb choice, showing enormous wood splinters interspersed with snow, the informational placard still on display for visitors.

According to Allday, visitors had wandered through the tree earlier that very day.

It’s not entirely clear why this storm felled the great tree, though the San Francisco Chronicle opined that it “probably had to do with the giant sequoia’s shallow root system — the roots only go about two or four feet deep — and the fact that the trail around the tree was flooded due to rain.”

“When I went out there [Sunday afternoon], the trail was literally a river, the trail is washed out,” Allday told the newspaper. “I could see the tree on the ground, it looked like it was laying in a pond or lake with a river running through it.”

Though the park eventually closed off the tree to cars, instead creating a 1.5-mile loop trail allowing hikers to walk through it, it remained one of the park’s most popular features, according to the Chronicle.

That was evident in the 1,500 comments on the association’s Facebook announcement of the tree’s fall, which was shared about 8,500 times as of early Monday morning.

Which means it fulfilled its original purpose, which was to compete with the Wawona Tree in the nearby Yosemite National Park. The North Grove’s owners carved out the Pioneer Cabin tree in response to the 1881 carving of that tree.

Much like the Pioneer Tree did for the North Grove, the Wawona Tree became an extremely popular tourist attraction for those visiting Yosemite. While its fame reached far and wide — the National Park Service claimed that some tourists still seek it, albeit often in the wrong park — it didn’t last nearly as long as the Pioneer Cabin tree.

In 1969, at the ripe old age of 2,100 years old, the 234-foot tree crashed to the ground during, as luck would have it, a winter storm.

One of the reasons for the falling of both trees might be the very thing that attracted visitors to them in the first place. These trees are made to burn, their protective bark healing itself over time. Carving into a fire scar slows this progress.

As written in a guide to the Calaveras Big Trees State Park, “Sierra redwoods evolved in the presence of fire, and not only have adapted to it, but depend on it in several ways. Heat from fire causes the cones to open and release the seeds. Fire clears the ground of duff, litter, and brush so the tiny seeds can reach the mineral soil and receive plenty of sunshine… The opening [in the Pioneer Cabin tree] has reduced the ability of the tree to resist fire. A few branches bearing green foliage tell us that this tree is still managing to survive.”</s>The historic Pioneer Cabin tree, a beloved 1000-year-old giant sequoia at Calaveras Big Trees State Park, was toppled by an onslaught of rain ... and human folly.

If this were an ordinary obituary, we’d talk about where the deceased was born and raised and the highlights of their life. In this case, it’s different – though the life was no less extraordinary than most dignitaries.

The giant sequoia known as Pioneer Cabin – one of the Golden State's best-known trees – was unable to bear the brunt of the winter storms that pummeled California over the weekend. It fell to the ground, shattering on impact.

A member of the giant sequoia grove in Calaveras Big Trees State Park, Pioneer Cabin stood among 250-tall trees estimated to be more than 1,000 years old. Pioneer stood apart, however, thanks to the tunnel carved into the trunk – which brought the towering tree much acclaim, but may have been the cause of its demise as well.

The tree was hollowed out in the 1880s – an attempt to lure tourists in the fashion of Yosemite’s famed Wawona tunnel tree. At the time, the Pioneer Cabin grove was part of a private resort.

Visitors could drive through the tree and it shot to fame, but, no surprise, the giant gaping hole in its trunk was not easy to endure.

“Because of the huge cut, this tree can no longer support the growth of a top, which you can see lying on the ground if you walk through the tunnel,” a park guide notes. “The opening also has reduced the ability of the tree to resist fire.”

At some point, the tunnel was closed to vehicular traffic and only open to hikers.

A volunteer at the park, Jim Allday, said the beauty fell down about 2 p.m. on Sunday and shattered on impact.

"When I went out there (Sunday afternoon), the trail was literally a river, the trail is washed out," Allday says. "I could see the tree on the ground, it looked like it was laying in a pond or lake with a river running through it."

Allday’s wife and also a volunteer, Joan Allday, says the tree had become increasingly weak and has been listing to one side for several years. "It was barely alive, there was one branch alive at the top," she says. "But it was very brittle and starting to lift."

The final cause of death has not been confirmed, but reportedly the giant sequoia's shallow root system was unable to withstand the rain which has flooded the park. (And ... maybe that giant hole carved out of its trunk?)

"This iconic and still living tree – the tunnel tree – enchanted many visitors. The storm was just too much for it," says the Calaveras Big Trees Association.

While it's heartbreaking to think about the human folly of boring a tunnel into a tree (carving one’s name into the trunk during the 19th century was also encouraged), Pioneer Cabin nonetheless brought countless visitors to the woods and is surely responsible for some transformative thinking. It’s hard not to be changed after standing among the giant sequoias. But hopefully we’ve gotten to the point where the majesty of these giants alone is enough to bring people to nature, that tunnels and gimmicks are no longer required. Because really, what’s more novel than a soaring 250-foot-tall tree that has lived since the Middle Ages?
A California storm in the Calaveras Big Trees State Park fells the 1,000-year-old American tree, the Pioneer Cabin Tree.