Things Falling Down

We've had a lot of rain over the last couple of days. This morning I looked out the window and something was missing. The echium has collapsed:

Whether it was the weight of all the water on it, or the soil softening because of the rain, I don't know. But it was probably close to the end of its flowering anyway. Bees were still visiting it though, later in the day once the rain stopped.

We went out this morning, and when we came home we met this just up the road:

The ute wasn't going to fit under that, even if it was safe to drive under.

It's another job for the tractor!

That's the ute at the far right, behind the leafy part of the branch.

Hard to see, but here a chain has been put around the branch:

 Then the tractor took off, and the branch came down:

and was dragged off the road:

Then I could drive the ute home.

I don't know when the branch came down. A woman drove up behind us, and told me that she had driven her car under the branch 3 hours earlier. She hadn't reported it to anyone, but thought "someone" would do something about it before she got back home. I wonder how many other people drove under it in those 3 hours?