roofs are collapsing

News is showing roofs are collapsing in New England. More snow on it's way. Wondering how pole barns are holding up, snow, Ice? Or do you think they have or will have new building codes for this much snow? How can the poles not get pushed in the ground unless some kind of footer was put in the hold before the poles were installed?

This may make some rethink how pole barns are built, especially in Northern states.

They are dropping like flies in NW Pa...
Can only be worse up there....

Here in MN footer has been required, and just common sense, about forever.

Wind will pull out a pole long before weight will push them in. Snow load will rip the trusses or bow out a weak post. The worst for that are when folks don't use a real pole, but set a cut off one on a cement knee wall - you have to make that connection between the pole and above ground platform very strong for sideways forces.

About every 10 years we get a winter that cleans out all the older weaker buildings, hardly makes the news any more locally....

Paul

There should be redundancy in the snow loading or in the design/construction, if its a possibility, or you had best get some or all of that snow off the roof. Trust me when I tell you, especially with the barn I posted some photos of, this is no fun task, that one you had best stand on the truss top chord, or risk going through, given the old perlins.

I'm not up to date or familiar with the existing snow loading and wood framed structure, but in this area, one would be smart to increase the safety margin on the design/construction of most any structure.

The sad thing about this is that when you get significant accumulations, more than likely you have ample time to remove it or at least lessen the load by removing some of it before it turns granular, hardens up and becomes monolithic.

Our old barns survived snow loads as I recall way back when in the early 70's that exceed any accumulations I have seen since, one was mortise and tenon with thick lumber for roof framing, the other a little more modern with what I believe was actual, not nominal lumber,(modern framing lumber). They knew how to build them way back when.

I can't say I could state how it works engineering wise, but I cannot see any poles supporting a pole barn roof, being further driven into the earth around here, way too much resistance, maybe soft ground ? There would have to be a concentrated point load and if that was so, the roof framing will fail first as I see it.

By 'real pole' I mean something from the truss that runs down into the ground over 4 feet. A laminated pole is stronger than a wood post these days of weaker twisted wood.

The weak designs are what is bolted together at a knee, without thinking of the side loads that joint gets from weight or wind....

Paul

In Ohio they seem to set the poles on a concrete cookie down in the hole. 3 foot deep hole is usually enough around here to stay below frost line.
Our Lester building came with U shaped rebars that went under the cookie than up each side of the pole and a 90* end you drive into the pole and hold it with staples. This would be to help prevent uplift. Most don't have this feature.
I forget which roof pitch is most common here ? But it's not too steep and not too flat but that doesn't really tell you much.

Here in North central Maine there is no particular problem with roof collapse because most people know enough to shovel roofs as it happens every year. Because of the cold temps, the snow has been light in weight so often times it blows off the roof.
Poles and footings have little to do with roof failure here, it is more the age of the barn. that being said, it seems that it is commercial buildings of a flat roof design that more commonly fail. Another 18 inches of snow due here Saturday night! Woo hoo!

mid-Ohio.
My 2 year old Lester building had 24" holes bored 54" deep - filled with 6" of concrete. Set 10' apart.
Laminated posts had "uplift" blocks spiked to the bottom of the posts. So what sat on the concrete was 5 2x6s.

The 6x6 posts of my building sit on 12 inch diameter concrete plugs, 12 inches thick. The tops of the plugs are at least 42 inches below the surface. The roof sheathing is 5/8" OSB. Trusses are 24 inches on center. The trusses sit on girders (headers) constructed of 3 2x10s with blocking to prevent twist. Posts are every 8 feet. I'm not too worried about snow load. I don't worry much about wind, either: In addition to the blocking, bracing and stringers between them, the roof trusses are tied down with hurricane clips.

If roofs are collapsing, either the people who built them are idiots, or the owners are. Perhaps both. I could see if if a person lived in Florida where snow build-up is not expected. In New England?? Put up a roof with an 80 lb. snow-load rating and a steel roof with at least a 4/12 pitch - and it will never build up enough snow to collapse.

When I was getting ready to build my shop building I tried Morton but they couldn't give me the pitch that I needed. I got it stick built with a steep pitch and it doesn't catch a lot of snow. Now the church that I belong to has much less pitch, and I am hoping for a good turn-out tomorrow to shovel it off.

Can you tell if the buildings are pole barns with metal roofs? How far apart are the trusses? Or is everyone's roof dropping like flies?

ok, well, here in SE PA, when we had 2 blizzards in a row, a hay customer of mine showed me his bad truss problem (their house is actually built in 1 end of the pole barn). The bottom cords were spreading apart at the splice plates. That's right, the splice plate barbs were slowly pulling out because the bottom cord was in extreme full tension. So, the weight on the roof deflects the top joist rafters, stretching the bottom cord, while the walls bend outwards. It only takes about 1" of splice plate movement to cause a collapse. So, go check your bottom cord splice plates and reinforce them !!!!! He did. Problem solved.

Building location has something to do with it. Here on the barren plains of northwest Iowa the buildings that are in the open don't accumulate much snow on the roof because the wind blows it off. Buildings behind groves or in other sheltered areas are the ones that get the snow load that collapses them. We had a bunch of roof collapses in my county a few years ago on buildings that were sheltered. My buildings didn't collect snow because I don't have enough wind shelter and it blows off so I didn't have to worry about the snow load. Some of the buildings that collapsed were cheap bargain sheds. Some of those were replaced with another cheap bargain shed! Go figure!

The year that fixerupper is referring to caused some pole sheds to collapse because it rained first and started freezing. If it was a slow transition to freezing the rain built up on some roofs and made a rough surface that held the snow from sliding off of tin roofs. That was when the roof got tested.

Every male child I grew up with earned his movie money shoveling roofs all winter long. I guess you'd have to search pretty far to find male children capable of doing that type of work these days.