Forster Pacific Palms SES unit commander Greg Dodd said his unit received a call at around 4:30am and arrived to see the gum tree laying between two houses.

"It's a massive tree," he said.

"It's been raining and the ground is wet and the tree has just let go."

Mr Dodd said there was significant damage to the roof of one house but thankfully no occupants were hurt.

He expected power outages would've been experienced across much of Smiths Lake as a result of the incident.

Smiths Lake resident Melinda Sharpe said her home was without power when she awoke but it had been restored when she left for work just after 7am.

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Essential Energy's Mid North Coast operational manager Mat Reedy confirmed that a significant proportion of customers in the area experienced an unplanned outage as a result of the incident.

"917 customers were without power from about 5:15am for just under two hours," Mr Reedy said.

"Crews responded immediately, securing safety of the site and carrying out the necessary repairs.

"Power was restored to all customers by 7:03am.

"Network protection equipment operated automatically to isolate the power supply to the area."

Mr Dodd said the incident was one of two jobs Forster Pacific Palms SES was called out to over the weekend, with the unit also being called to patch a leaking roof at Forster this morning.

He said it had been a favourable start to the summer storm season, but the unit would have to wait and see what the weather dished up over the coming months, particularly with a La Nina in place.

Pacific Palms received 64mm of rain in the 24 hours between 9am Sunday, October 18 and 9am Monday, October 19, while Forster received 21mm and Tuncurry received 27mm.

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