Helios | Coast Redwood

Continued from: Coast Redwoods

Copyright 2009 - 2011 by Mario Vaden

Helios coast redwood was discovered July 1, 2006, a little past 6pm in the evening by Chris Atkins and Michael Taylor in Redwood National Park. Previous to this find, Stratosphere Giant was the tallest known in the world. And Helios became the tallest tree for a while until Hyperion was discovered by the same two men later that year in another valley on August 25, 2005. Also on July 1, 2006, less than an hour after discovering Helios, Atkins and Taylor found Icarus, another coast redwood, which was 371' tall. That was two redwoods in just one hour, each taller than the previous height champion. The area of Helios Grove which has remained a secret for quite some time was nicknamed Dry Heaves Creek, mentioned in a book. It's the same valley where those men found the redwood Maia, 354' tall, the end of 2005. Helios is up on a hill, not next to a creek.

For the present, I'm not posting a full trunk view of Helios, because its been unpublished more or less. Also, there is something pretty outstandingly weird about it, that may best remain a secret for a while. For now, here is part of the trunk, about 120' high. You can see the pitting from forest fire. Must have been a substantial fire to make flame up to that point. There is a close-up shown on the Hyperion page, and may be the only bone to throw for a clue at this time.

For reference, in 2009, measurments tof Helios are 375.9' or 114.58 m high, and 16.0' or 4.96 m diameter. The 2006 measurements, and these 2009 measurements, mean Helios is only about 4 feet shorter than Hyperion. Sword fern is a dominant forest floor cover around Helios.