Co-worker loses her 57 due to the snow storm

She and her family live in Mississippi. The roof of their 60x60 shop collapsed, and the beam landed directly on her 57. The truck was just completed 2 weeks ago. Her husband's C10 (his grandfather is the original owner) had the roof land on it, but it only resulted in a 2 inch scratch to the paint, thankfully.

Her husband also runs a custom parts/accessories business out of this building, so the impact is greater than just the damage to their personal property.

Damn, that's grim. Hopefully all can be repaired, but it still sucks. For a long time.
Saw a photo of a kitchen in Houston: a solid ice "waterfall" from roof to floor, a couple feet in diameter.
Nothing compared to that shop, though.

I'd hazzard a guess that that was not an engineered building. Just out of curiosity, where's the beam that's supposed to be supporting that I-beam ?? And roof trusses on what, 4-foot centers ?!?! Storing $100k vehicles in $100 sheds ... you kinda deserve whatever ya get !!

Took all of 2 replies. That's fast, even for Moparts.

What a shame. Since she's a co worker of yours I assume being in the insurance business it was properly insured. I sure hope so.

Man that sucks. Can a new roof be grafted on to repair the truck or is it totaled?
A canopy or breezeway at the entrance of a business collapsed in Chicago the other day under the weight of the snow, killed a guy standing outside the door having a smoke.

Truck is insured. Her husband and her father in law are very talented/skilled car builders, so I have no doubt it will get fixed.

That's sad. I hate to see a restored classic damaged like that...

I wonder what caused the roof failure (other than overload of course)? The end of that I-beam looks like a poorly penetrated weld on the plate (and maybe the end of the beam too)?

I'm thinking that can be rebuilt with a donor. Just a point, take a look at that beam. Does that not look like the beam actually snapped?

Yeah, the weld appears to be a concern. Regardless, I doubt that codes in MS are similar to codes in the Northeast/Midwest, because how often do they get snow like this?

Wow, man that's too bad. Especially after just finishing it... geez.

At least it sounds like they will be capable of fixing it again, but it sure would be hard to have to re-do something that was just done.

I'm not the only one who noticed this! If you look at the end of the "I" beam it look like somebody welded a plate on the inside. This is not the way to weld I beams together. Back yard builders probably. Hopefully either the vehicle or homeowners insurance will cover it. And have somebody skilled rebuild the roof.

Sad to see a beautiful ride like this.

I'd be willing to guess it's a home built building. It appears that the rafter was spliced with a scab plate welded to it and the weld failed.

They did not build the building themselves.

Any idea how much accumulated snow was on the roof ??
Bummer and glad it was insured

I'd be having a conversation with my contractor then.

IMHO as a structural steel fabricator, this was not a complete (PEMB) pre-engineered building kit. Somebody went to MBCI, Mueller Supply or similar and bought purlins, panels and other components and pieced something together. From what I can make out, looks like really crappy workmanship. I don't know if Mississippi has contractor licensing, whether this area requires building permits or whatever else that would give at least an illusion of competence here. If nothing else works out they could roll the dice on a lawsuit. 2¢

That's really sad that that happened. Hopefully they can get that truck fixed and get their shed rebuilt.

About 20 or 25 years ago, a guy in our car club had his entire collection of really nice cars severely damaged when his pole barn collapsed under a heavy snow load. The issue there was that overhanging trees had caused an accumulation of sap on the metal roof panels, which made it sticky, so the ice and snow didn't slide off easily, leading to a heavy buildup. At least that's what he said afterwards. Because of that, I watch my pole barn roof very carefully. If I get a foot of snow up there I have the roofers come out and shovel it off. Not worth the risk of leaving snow up there.

That sucks. I was going to say that beam looks like it had a plate welded to it. I'm guessing there is probably a lot of problems like that in areas where freak storms come along.

seams odd to me that the grooves in the roof panels are not running in a direction that would allow the water/snow to drain down off the roof. Looks as if the stuff would lock into the grooves running right to left instead of top to bottom.

There is SOOO much wrong with the construction of that building. It was not a kit, as they generally have things like instructions and diagrams and the proper parts to put it together. This was clearly put together by someone who had no clue what they were doing. Sad about the truck but all they had to do was simply look UP and see the serious and obvious issues with that building and they wouldn't have parked it there...or even worked in that mess.

Structurally that's the way they have to span. That and other clues led me to believe the design work was done by SRE, Southern Redneck Engineering, I've seen their work before.

I don't disagree with anything said and would like to point out that too many people do not enough of a basic foundation of knowledge to see the issues even if they looked up, which is why too many things like this get hired out to incompetent "experts" that talk a good game.

I agree!! How much snow?? We currently have a couple feet of snow on the ground/buildings. I haven't seen anything about any roof collapses etc.I know they don't build for snow load down south but I gotta think a well built building would easily deal with 6 or more inches of snow load. Is this more snow than that? I also agree that the roof panels appear to be running in the wrong direction and that is a BIG beam to fail under snow load of any size. Lots of questions here. Hope they get everything handled....looked like a great truck!!

Well as long as we're on that topic ... WHERE IS THE SNOW ?!?!?!? Did they wait for it all to melt before taking the photo? If there was that much exposure you couldn't get enough heat in the building to melt it. So where is it ????

What is your problem?

Yes it sucks, but that is what insurance is for, and that is nothing compared to "losing" a car in a fire. That truck is easily repaired, half of it can still be used! Don't try this at home, though the guy I sold it to had it back on the road the next year...

The Transam got saved?

Yes, I put it on Craigslist and got a reply almost immediately. He was in the next town over and wanted to see it right away. Only question he has was if I had the build sheet and did it say Y88 on it, which it did, Gold Edition SE with T-Tops. By the time I delivered it he already had a gold parts car in his driveway! He was a true late 70's Pontiac guy as he had a 77 Can Am in the garage...

Sounds like the perfect opportunity to take a 2" chop from the roof Lemonade from lemons I'm an eternal optimist, sometimes

Gus

There appears to be something really wrong with the design and/or fab of the buildings roof. If your co-worker has any other buildings on her property built by the same guy she should have them inspected immediately. My guess is that some really shoddy work was performed on that building.

Sorry to see that happen, but I do agree with every comment that the building was so poorly built. Especially the first one...



and this one had me rolling. "SRE"...hilarious




This country isn't (yet) a 3rd world dump, so don't be cheap when it comes to building any structures. Code, or no code.

I don't think the roof metal is running the wrong way. The purlings are running parallel to the side wall with the roof metal perpendicular to it. It appears to me that a splice in the rafter failed and the roof colapsed.

I don't even see any purlins? It looks like the sheet metal is supported directly by the rafters, which is why they had to run the sheet metal grooves horizontally (which is wrong). If they had the correct purlins in place running horizontally between the rafters, then they could have run the sheet metal vertically on top of the purlins. This allows the rain and snow to drain off as it should.

As others have said, there are several issues with the way that roof was built that contributed to the accident.

The I beam appears to be fractured which is a very odd failure for a beam that large. Steel beams that size don't usually fracture when overloaded, they typically bend and yield. The fracture seems to indicate that the beam was either made from very low quality steel or perhaps it was damaged at some point. Maybe poor welding or someone used a torch to bend it or something? I really can't say just based on a picture but if I was hired to figure out what happened to the building I'd start with that fracture.

Kind of looks like the old Liberty ship brittle fracture issue. Back in WWII there were a bunch of brittle fractures that sunk or damaged the Liberty ships. The issue was poor quality steel and poor welding practices. The steel became brittle in cold weather and the hulls would crack open. Possibly the same defect that caused the Titanic to crack open. Those kinds of problems aren't supposed to still be around these days since steel mfgs know better and welders are supposed to know better. So kind of scary to see that fracture.

Damn shame about the truck. Hope they get it fixed.

If that overhead door is on the a side wall what you are calling rafters are the purlings and the beam that was scabbed and broke is the rafter. Without more pbotos its almost impossible to know.

I got to say thats heartbreaking, glad no life was lost. No one builds anything with plans of it falling down, unfortunate.

The end of the beam has marks on it that make it look like it was existing and had a plate welded on it.

It looked to me like the end of the beam fractured but it could also be that the end of the beam was cut with a torch and that it was held in place with a bracket welded across the middle. That would be a very, very crude way to build a building but I suppose it is possible. Hard to say without being there and looking at stuff. We only one one picture and it isn't that clear so I'm not jumping to a conclusion. Just saying that if a person wanted to know why it failed they should start by looking at the I beam.

Quick Google search shows some areas of Mississippi received 6" of snow, I'm assuming it began and ended as ice?

In Memphis there was an ice storm Thurs followed by 11 inches of snow......My carport is the most rickety thing in the world, I thought for sure the snow would mess it up....It survived fine.....That garage beam must have had a very questionable no penetration weld.

yep doesn't look like it was setting on any bearing .

I find this comment hilarious ... in a country where mobile homes and trailer parks reign supreme !!

So I don't know if you guys have "tempos" down there but up here in the great white north just about everyone has one - thin tube framework covered with a tarp. They will take anything winter can throw at them and they don't collapse. So ya really gotta wonder just how poorly build that shop was !!!

That's probably one of the more ignorant statements I've seen on Moparts.