RV Storage

We drove through Midlothian, TX a few days ago and saw this. I didn't have my camera, so we drove through again today.

The roof on this covered RV storage facility caved in during our recent snowstorm. Besides feeling very sorry for the damages some people will have, we wondered if any of the owners were planning on any trips soon.




This Prowler in the first slot was damaged.


Some units had damage at the front ends, but the backs looked okay.


Some units, like this Hitchhiker, fared pretty well - for now. We don't know how much care can be taken when they start demolishing the structure.

Man, stuff like that makes me sick to my stomach. I hope they all had good insurance and kept it current during the winter months.

What a terrible feeling they must have. If that was my rig I would be heartbroken. Hopefully no one was hurt.

Makes me wonder if buildings in the south have to consider snow loading in the design process. Up here we do.

John

We get some snow here, and quite a bit of freezing rain. I'm sure our codes are written for a certain amount of snow.... maybe 4-6 inches. That last snow was 9.5 inches of extremely wet heavy snow...... much more than we are used to getting. It was great for making snowmen and forts. Not so great for shoveling out of driveways. We just waited for it to melt, which it did in a little more than a day. Now it is snowing again...we're hoping it doesn't mount up.

Richard, Scruffy had that same thought about some of those owners dropping their insurance during the winter months. I think RV storage businesses probably have contracts that exclude covering theft or vandalism - maybe damage caused by roof cave-ins would be covered.

I'll bet they don't have any recourse against the storage owners either.

Ours made it clear they would not be responsible for any loss or damage to our Cat if anything happened while it's stored.

I'll echo Richard's sentiments, cuz if they're not insured, they're just S O L !!

TC

Since I am a structural engineer for a living.....

Snow loads are based on climate data for the region if you are in snow country. In the valley I live in, the snow loads are 30psf (pounds per square foot). Up at Lake Tahoe 7-10 miles away and up a couple thousand feet, it is 150psf (lake level) to 350psf (at 10000 ft). They don't base it on the number of inches due to the varying moisture contents.

The ground snow load there in Midlothian, TX is only 5psf so I doubt they design for it. The minimum roof live load is 20psf though. that alone should have covered the snow you got. If they didn't design to that load, well that's what happens. Add the open structure and wind and you further complicate things.

There were quite a few roof collapses. One was a funeral home in Red Oak, another was a marina in Cedar Hill.

I don't know how many psi our 9.5 inches of wet snow had, it was enough to do some damage. We were thinking of covering our patio with a roof that would have a very slight pitch. We'll go back to the drawing board regarding that. :-)