Wednesday, December 23, 2009
School roof collapses under weight of snow
There's still a lot of snow lying around -- in one case, enough to collapse the roof of a school.
Stephanie Klein-Davis | The Roanoke Times
A blanket of rooftop snow slumps over a gutter as it begins to melt Tuesday morning in Southwest Roanoke County.
From today's paper
- Mountainside residents relish snow and solitude
- School roof collapses under weight of snow
- Roanoke's 1,200 miles of streets called 'passable'
- Weather Journal: Christmas stocking full of ice, rain, wind
More winter weather resources
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Part of the roof at Roanoke County's Fort Lewis Elementary School caved in Monday under the weight of heavy snow.
No one was injured in the collapse, but school officials are unsure whether the damage will displace classes when winter break ends.
Students went on break Friday and will be off until Jan. 4. But Superintendent Lorraine Lange said the building may not be ready by then, so school officials are exploring alternatives and developing contingency plans for Fort Lewis' 240 students.
"If there's a bright side to this, it's that no one was in the building," school spokesman Chuck Lionberger said.
A section of the roof, about 20 feet by 30 feet, covering the cafeteria buckled under the accumulation from the weekend's snowstorm, he said. It was unclear Tuesday how much the repair will cost or how long it will take.
Fort Lewis Principal Kim Bradshaw was at a holiday party with friends Monday evening when she heard about the incident. Bradshaw said a physical education teacher, who had stopped at the school to pick up something, heard water running and discovered the mess in the cafeteria. The teacher phoned Bradshaw.
"Within half an hour, everyone was here," she said Tuesday morning in the school's parking lot.
Building officials inspected the school Tuesday and representatives from the school's insurance company visited. Lionberger said cleanup will begin today.
ADVICE ON HANDLING ROOF DAMAGE
The roof of a county residence and a gas station canopy also collapsed over the weekend. But Jeff Shawver, Roanoke's building commissioner, said most roofs are built to withstand extreme weather conditions. He said he understands the concerns of home- and business owners, especially with the possibility of rain, ice and gusty winds over Christmas, which could saturate any existing snow, result in heavy drifting snow loads and possibly freeze over, blocking roof drainage.
Shawver's advice:
- Walk around the outside of your property and look for large buildups of drifting snow or an entire sheet of snow (like an avalanche waiting to happen) about to fall from one part of the roof to another. The greatest dangers are these enormous weight imbalances.
- Be on the lookout for anything out of the ordinary, such as cracks in the ceiling, hairline fractures that weren't there before the snow, any leaking or strange sounds.
If you detect any of the above conditions, go to the phone book and call a structural engineer for an inspection.
