Mobile phone footage allegedly showing the moment the famous Sycamore Gap tree crashed to the ground to the sound of a chainsaw has been played to jurors.
Groundworker Daniel Graham, 39, and mechanic Adam Carruthers, 32, each deny two counts of criminal damage to the tree and to Hadrian’s Wall, overnight on 28 September 2023.
Jurors at Newcastle Crown Court heard the tree was a “totemic” feature of Northumberland and was part of a place “much loved by many thousands of people”.
The video clip lasting two minutes and 40 seconds was recovered from Graham’s phone and played to the court twice – once showing the dark, raw footage, and a second time after it had been enhanced by a police specialist.
In the enhanced black and white version, with audio of wind blowing and a chainsaw buzzing, a figure can be seen working at the trunk of the tree, before it finally crashes to the ground.
Richard Wright KC, prosecuting, said the original video was enhanced by changing the contrast, putting a border around the frame and brightening the film “so it could be seen more clearly”.
The prosecution said the two friends travelled to the location in the pitch black during Storm Agnes and used a chainsaw to fell the sycamore, which then crashed on to Hadrian’s Wall.
The damage caused was valued at £622,191 for the tree and £1,144 to the Roman wall, which is a Unesco World Heritage Site.
The court has heard that Graham, of Carlisle, and Adam Carruthers, of Wigton, Cumbria, swapped messages after word spread of the tree being felled.
A statement by Tony Wilmott, a senior archaeologist with Historic England, said he produced a seven-page report into the damage caused to Hadrian’s Wall.
He said the Sycamore Gap name was coined in the 1980s and over the decades it has become one of Northumberland’s most appreciated features.
He said: “Its unmistakable profile has been repeated in many media and because of this it has become totemic.
“It has become a place of marriage proposals, family visits and even the location of ashes to be spread.
“The place is much loved by many thousands of people.”
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A statement from archaeologist and inspector for Historic England Lee McFarlane some of the stones in Hadrian’s Wall were damaged when the tree was felled, the court heard.
The wall and the tree belong to the National Trust.
The trial continues.
