Man killed in logging accident west of Healdsburg identified

The man killed in a logging accident west of Healdsburg on Wednesday was a veteran tree cutter with 30 years of experience operating chainsaws in the forest, his employer and close personal friend said Thursday.

Alan Eugene Mohr, 61, of Point Arena in Mendocino County was a “dear friend of myself and so many others,” said Fred Euphrat of Healdsburg, who owned the land where Mohr was found by co-workers about 5:30 p.m. Wednesday.

“Needless to say, we are shaken,” Euphrat said, describing Mohr as a “hardworking, kind and generous man.”

The Sonoma County Sheriff’s Office on Thursday identified Mohr as the victim of the incident, which is under investigation by the Division of Occupational Safety and Health, known as Cal/OSHA. Mohr’s family was located and informed of his death, Sheriff’s Sgt. Cecile Focha said.

The Healdsburg Fire Department said Wednesday that Mohr was crushed by a section of a felled tree that he was cutting into pieces on private property at 6699 Mill Creek Road, about midway between Highway 101 and Austin Creek State Recreation Area.

Mohr was discovered by three co-workers who had noticed he was missing. The incident occurred on a steep, heavily wooded hillside about 50 feet below a logging road, Fire Capt. Mack Montanye said.

Mohr was cutting up a felled ?112-foot tree when part of it hit him in the chest, throwing him back about 10 feet and pinning him down, Montanye said. Whether he was wearing a hard hat and safety glasses “wouldn’t have helped,” Euphrat said.

The Coroner’s Office will schedule a forensic pathologist to conduct an autopsy to determine the cause and manner of Mohr’s death, Focha said.

Euphrat, whose family has owned the undeveloped forestland since 1960, confirmed that Mohr was working by himself, the customary practice in timber cutting to avoid felling a tree on someone else. Mohr was a licensed forester whom Euphrat had employed for about 15 years.

Mohr submitted harvest plans over the years and was known to Cal Fire, the agency that regulates timber harvest operations, a Cal Fire official said Thursday.

The official confirmed that Euphrat, a one-time candidate for the Board of Supervisors in 2002, had a non-industrial timber management plan for the Mill Creek property, a permit that allows “selective cutting,” leaving trees of various ages in place, as opposed to clear-cutting.

Euphrat, a licensed forester who owns a forestry consulting firm in Healdsburg, Forest, Soil and Water, said he had filed a notice of timber operations earlier this year to log 50 acres of redwood and fir forest on a 400-acre parcel.

The logging, which started in June, was nearly complete, and the trees Mohr was cutting were intended for an environmental restoration project in Southern California, Euphrat said.

Three other workers, who were subcontractors to his firm, were working with Mohr.

Mohr was not married and had no children, Euphrat said. His permanent residence was in Point Arena, but he was caring for and living with his elderly father in Novato.

Cal/OSHA is investigating the fatality, said Julia Bernstein, an agency spokeswoman. Euphrat said he had not been contacted by the state agency, nor had its representatives been to the site.

Farming, fishing and forestry occupations accounted for 19 of the 334 California workplace fatalities in 2014, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Only three deaths were due to contact with objects and equipment, while eight were related to transportation in those three occupations.

Transportation and material moving occupations registered 83 deaths and construction and extraction occupations accounted for 47 fatalities, the bureau said.

You can reach Staff Writer Guy Kovner at 521-5457 or guy.kovner@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @guykovner.