ATLANTA — City officials are looking into how a worker on a tree removal crew was killed while working out of a bucket truck Monday in northwest Atlanta.
Donald Rembert, who worked for the city for nearly 30 years and was just months away from retirement, was killed while cutting tree limbs on Spring Lake Drive.
Channel 2 Action News has learned Rembert was working in a bucket about 40 feet off the ground when a tree limb or section of a tree fell onto the bucket and knocked him to the ground. He was pronounced dead at the scene.
Family members say he was known as "Rem."
“When I called him today and the phone went to voicemail, I knew something was wrong,” Rembert’s sister-in-law, Cynthia Smith, said. “No matter what time I call him, he answered that phone. When he didn’t answer, I called my sister. When she called me back and said it was Rem, I lost it.”
"He used to make me put a smile on my face, and I used to put a smile on his face," said Makayla Austin, Rembert’s 11 year old granddaughter. "He was a fantastic granddaddy. We all loved him and cherished him." %
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Rembert was raising his fiancés three grandkids.
"He was a good person, and that kind of outweighed the bad," Smith said. "Rem, I love you, and I miss you, and I’ll see you at the crossroad."
Austin said she’ll never forget how Rembert used to cheer her up by picking her up and spinning her around her bedroom.
"He used to throw me on the bed. That used to be funny," Austin said. "I'll remember him as a granddaddy who took me in, took me, raised my family, even my grandma, and gave us a place to live and a place we could call home."
Neighbors said development and increasing traffic in the area has weakened the root system of many large trees, making them vulnerable to collapse.
“Soil erosion, clearing on Collier (Street); they are building so many houses, water just pours down the street,” Millie Coleman said. “We’ve had trouble on this street with sinkholes, because the dirt is so fine. We’ve lost along this street a big tree every year for the last six years.”
Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed sent Channel 2 Action News a statement that reads, in part: "Donald was a caring friend and a valued coworker.”
The mayor says the city will conduct an investigation into the accident. He also ordered new safety training for workers out in the field.