[Strawbale] Death in collapsing SB house

[William R Bloom]

Well, without knowing the details, the roof failing is 
probably a function of the roof structure itself.  (I'm 
assuming its not a strawbale roof....).  This is not 
uncommon in high snow load areas particularly if drifting 
causes loads more concentrated than uniform.

If a lintel or header bearing the reactions from roof 
structural members failed, such as a lintel bearing on a 
strawbale wall, I would think that it would cause a shift 
or settling of the roof, not a failure and would be less 
prone to causing fatal collapsing conditions.

It would be interesting to learn the cause.

Bill
Albuquerque


On Wed, 19 Mar 2008 02:18:51 -0400
  "Rob Tom" <ArchiLogic at yahoo.ca> wrote:
> On Tue, 18 Mar 2008 15:58:35 -0400, 
><dfugler at cmhc-schl.gc.ca> wrote:
>>
>> Someone died in the collapse of a Quebec straw bale 
>>house under heavy  
>> snow loads last weekend. He was able to evacuate the 
>>wife and children  
>> before
>> the roof fell in and crushed him. Here is a link to the 
>>story (in  
>> French).
>> I have learned that the house was straw bale from other 
>>sources. It is  
>> not stated in the article.
>>
>> http://www.canoe.com/infos/societe/archives/2008/03/20080317-054702.html
>>
>> Someone with structural expertise should probably follow 
>>this up and
>> report on it to the SB community.
> 
> I just did a quick search to see if there might be other 
>reports in the  
> media on this collapse (there are many it seems) and 
>here are a couple of  
> English-language hits, one (the first link below) with a 
>photo that shows  
> some straw bales laying on the ground.
> 
> http://www.thespec.com/News/BreakingNews/article/340935
> 
> http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20080316.wcollapse17/BNStory/National/home
> 
> I don't know that there's much to report to the SB 
>community specifically  
> WRT to SB structurally because the roof collapse would 
>have to do with  
> deficiencies in the roof framing and/or roof design. I 
>recently posted a  
> link to story about a roof collapse here in Ottawa (on a 
>non-SB house)  
> that occurred a few days before the Quebec SB house roof 
>collapse.
> http://groups.yahoo.com/group/SB-r-us, Message # 13525.
> 
> One of the stories reported that the Quebec SB home was 
>owner-built and  
> one might speculate that that may have also have been a 
>factor.
> 
> But I suspect that the biggest factor in the collapse 
>may have been that  
> the house was deep in the woods.  Trees surrounding the 
>home would prevent  
> winds from sweeping some of the snow accumulations off 
>of the roof and  
> with the record snowfalls we've had this winter, it 
>wouldn't take much to  
> overload a roof built just to Code specs, especially if 
>there was an  
> eccentric loading situation (ie a north slope sheltered 
>by the trees and  
> in shade, south  slope exposed to sun & melt).
> 
> I spent part of last Saturday morning clearing off snow 
>and ice that had  
> accumulated on a sheltered porch roof on the north side 
>of my own home, in  
> anticipation of rains that the weather forecasters had 
>predicted for the  
> weekend but fortunately didn't come.
> 
> The low-slope porch roof is one storey below the main 
>house roof and the  
> snow/ice had piled up to the full height of the second 
>storey wall (ie  
> snow blocked out a second storey window) + the 2 ft 
>depth of the parallel  
> chord roof truss at the eave... so that the foot-or-so 
>accumulation of  
> snow on top of the main roof (metal) made a smooth slope 
>of snow from the  
> roof to the built-in gutters of the porch roof so that 
>the show/ice was  
> about 10 feet deep in the corner adjacent to two 
>perpendicular walls.
> 
> If the rains had come and the snow had not been cleared 
>off, the snow,  
> like a sponge, would have sucked up the rain, further 
>exacerbating the  
> already overloaded condition of the roof.
> 
> I've been meaning to put a glass over-roof over that 
>porch roof (to create  
> a second storey porch) for quite some time now 
>specifically so as to avoid  
> having to shovel of that roof in years of extraordinary 
>snowfalls but  
> well, you know. Maybe I'll get around to it sometime 
>this decade.
> 
> -- 
> === * ===
> Rob Tom
> Kanata, Ontario, Canada
> < A r c h i L o g i c  at chaffY a h o o  dot  c a >
> manually winnow the chaff from my edress in your reply
> 
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