Cedar Rapids mushroom hunter nearly killed by falling tree

A wind-toppled dead hickory tree nearly killed Cedar Rapids mushroom hunter Denis Berns during a May 1 hunt in a Fayette County timber.

Berns, 51, who suffered eight broken bones and internal injuries, said he heard “a little snap” just before a crushing weight drove him face-first into the ground, his upper body bent unnaturally over his legs.

“I couldn't move. I couldn't breathe,” Berns recalled.

The blow had knocked the wind out of him, and the weight of the tree had compressed his lungs and pinned his nose and mouth in the dirt. Berns said he felt panic but successfully resisted it.

“I knew I was close to passing out for lack of air. I wrenched one arm free and started digging like a dog until I finally got one finger in my mouth and cleared out a little air passage,” he said.

Berns had been hunting with two friends, Clyde Pickett of Randalia and Rick Miller of Fayette, but one had gone back to the vehicle to retrieve something and the other had drifted off into the timber in pursuit of morels.

Though Berns had a cell phone in his pocket, he could not reach it and, as it turned out, he'd have lacked service anyway.

Berns estimates he lay there struggling to breathe and in pain for at least 15 minutes before his friends saw one of his shoes lying nearby and deduced that he was pinned beneath the fallen tree.

The two of them together lacked the strength to move the tree enough to free their friend. They found a long, stout tree branch, which they used as a lever to slightly lift the tree while securing their progress with blocks.

Berns credits Pickett's first aid training with keeping his injuries, which included four broken ribs and four broken vertebra, from becoming even more serious. “He knew what to do. He kept me from moving any more than necessary,” Berns said.

Pickett and Miller took Berns to West Union, where he was airlifted to University Hospitals in Iowa City for five days' treatment before his release in an upper body cast. He said he expects to make a full, if lengthy, recovery.

Berns, who had collected “half a bread sack” before the fallen tree ended the hunt, said he will hunt morels again, but never on a windy day.

He also said the incident has changed his life. “Lying under that tree, I had time to do some praying and soul searching. I am going to go to church and do some other different things,” he said.