Man killed as tree falls on house

PHOTOS BY KURT IMMLER | BGNN

By BOB MOREHEAD | BGNN senior staff writer

BARBERTON A 21-year-old man was killed April 15 as a large tree fell on a house on Second Street NW.

The Barberton Fire Department got the call at 11:16 a.m. and forced their way in, finding Noah Hall, 21, dead under the tree. Units from all over the county rolled in to help remove the tree and access the victim as part of the Summit County Special Operations Rescue Team.

Also helping were Barberton Tree Service, Rick’s Crane Service, the Summit County Medical Examiner’s Office, the Barberton building and street departments, Victims’ Assistance, the American Red Cross and Ohio Edison. Ad-Direct and Topcraft volunteered their space as a staging area.

Hall was from Owensboro, Kentucky and had just come to Ohio six months ago his mother, Ashley Hall, told BGNN.

“He moved up there to discover life,” his mom said.

She said he loved life and his sisters, being the only boy in the family. He enjoyed football and video games and had graduated Clinton High School in Tennessee in 2021. At the time of his death, he was employed at Norton’s Wendy’s.

“He was a joy to talk to,” she said. “He was your go-to if you needed someone to listen.”

In Kentucky, she’s still working on processing it all.

“This is the nightmare no parent ever wants to face,” she said.

Lisa Devenport, president of Barberton Tree Service, knew exactly how to respond the moment she received the call about the accident. She immediately began assembling a crew and equipment. Devenport and Aaron Wagnitz, crane operator and lead foreman, Paul Zentiska III, foreman, and Braylon Maurer and Sonny Starnes, support staff, met Rick Devenport, owner and certified crane operator at Rick’s Crane Service, on the scene. They responded within 20 minutes of the call from dispatch.

Lisa Devenport also knew all too well that sinking feeling associated with having to assist safety services with helping to retrieve a deceased individual from under a fallen tree.

Not even 11 months earlier she had responded to a similar call in Akron.

In a story that appeared in May 2024 in The BGNN, Devenport had said, “In my 27 years at Barberton Tree Service I had never taken a call like this.”

On May 22, 2024, Akron Fire Department contacted Devenport and she assembled a team to respond to Sumner Street in Akron to help emergency crews when a tree had fallen on a house and a 33-year-old man was found dead on the top floor underneath part of the tree.

Less than a year later, Devenport said the details with having to remove the large dead tree from the Barberton house were eerily similar to last year’s incident in Akron.

“I’m just devastated,” she said.

She was grateful to emergency crews on scene who worked well with her and her employees — who are well trained and professional in any situation — but the tragic accident goes above their typical daily calls.

“Watching this happen twice within one year … it’s heartbreaking beyond what people can understand,” she said. “We want to remove the tree before it’s on the house. We like to tell people to get ahead of it and don’t wait until this happens. I feel devastated for the family.”

She reminds homeowners, landlords, business owners and property owners to seek routine assessments from companies with certified ISA (International Society of Arboriculture) arborists, especially on trees close to structures even if it’s a neighboring property.

She encourages people to talk to neighbors and communicate concerns with owners of the property about dead trees and trees close to structures and call a professional for an assessment.

BGNN managing editor Christina McCune contributed to this report