Snow Loads...
 

Just sending the word out that there is a ton of snow up around the lake and that's a whole lot of weight for a roof to support. I shoveled off my roof and in some spots I had close to 3 feet of snow and that was as of last weekend. Just saying may be a good idea to clear those roof tops! ;)

Yep, and there is more warm weather for a day and rain also. Got mine done this weekend.:)

Had my roof shoveled for the first time this Winter, yesterday. Took the guy from 11:00 til 5:00 to clean off the roof, paths deck and porch.

Cost
 

I'm curious what the cost would be to have someone clear the roof. Was it by the hour or job?

Even if it is few hundred. It is a lot cheaper then a collapsed roof. One women died in her car under a car port in Mass. What would be the cost of a house caving in?

I may be totally off base here and happy to defer to the regular forum contributors who are contractors, but don't the building codes here in the northeast take into account the fact that it can and does snow here? Is it really a huge concern for the normal residential dwelling?

BT

I did it myself, but I know the prior owner of my place spent 500 bucks to have somebody do it for him several years ago....which is a total rip off considering I did it in about an hour. It was a flat fee for the job.

Not everything is built to code unfortunately. Any flat or low pitched roof would also be a problem with a heavy snow load and then a rain storm. Lots of camps around the lake probably wouldn't hold up any where near as well as a newly constructed home.
A sad and tragic example is the woman in Weymouth MA who was killed today when a carport collapsed on her vehicle with her in it due to snow load.

I only mention it cause with 3+ feet of rain saturated snow equals a significant load. Building codes change, so an older structure may not be as well engineered, heck some I looked at when I was looking to purchase didn't look like they were engineered at all. Just sayin... ;)

I agree with Maxum on this. Particularly on the islands, a lot of the construction work in the 50's, 60's and 70's was done by the original owners. Some had good knowledge and skills, others were less qualified. Code enforcement didn't really exist on the islands much before the mid 1980's. We looked at some gems before finding our lot and building new. That being said, if the place has survived 50+ years, chances are it's had this much snow on the roof before.

A few years back we had a huge amount of snow here in CT. The roof rakes sold out quickly. I flew up to Laconia a bought a couple at the hardware store in Lakeport. Driving from the airport to my home in CT I saw several guys on their roofs shoveling snow. That night the 11:00 news had a story from a hospital emergency room. The doc there said they had several folks treated for falling off their roofs and ZERO treated for roof collapse.

There used to be a smallish Buick-GMC Truck dealer building across from the Plymouth Walmart which collapsed under the snow maybe ten years ago. General Motors had a first refusal agreement to purchase it and when the local owner decided to sell after about 25-years in business, GM went and bought so it would close it down as GM felt it had too many dealers, or something. Anyway, shortly after GM closed on the sale, the building collapsed under the snow, and the commercial lot is still up for sale to this day.

shoveling the roof
 

My first concern is that I or whoever I have do it slips and falls. My second concern is that I or who I hire to do it does damage to the roof shingles that may take some time to discover. 3rd concern is do I have enough insurance to cover a collapse.
Personally, I'd rather not risk the fall or the damaged roof. The insurance company says it's covered, I'm good with that.
The cottege is about 60 years old and has survived to date. My son and I did shovel it off one time a few years ago, I promised myself that I would never do it again.

You wouldn't think that 500 bucks was a lot when you slipped and fall off the ladder or roof and received a SCI (Spinal Cord Injury) and you ended up in a wheelchair for the rest of your life. Shoveling a roof should be left to professionals not homeowners. You also need to know what your doing so you don't ruin the shingles. If homeowners want to use a roof rake that's fine but don't try to climb on a roof!!

Roof Rakes...
 

Conduct electricity well. Beware of power lines!

An inch of rain, totally retained by a snow pack on the roof, will add just five lb/sq.ft. of load. Of course, that could be the straw breaking the camel's back. Others are right that many of the older structures weren't built to anything resembling present code, which in Moultonborough allows for a 70 lb/sqft snow load. Yet these older structures survive year after year, many of which don't get visited during the winter at all.

Still, seeing a three-foot drift piled on the downwind side of the ridge on our cottage roof made me nervous enough that I went up the other day and spent an hour dumping the bulk of that load onto the ground. I left a couple inches of crusty stuff, and I didn't touch the windward side at all, as the load there was far less than where the turbulence of the wind going over the ridge drifts the snow just downwind of the ridge. After I unloaded the roof to a point of satisfaction, I remembered that I have a roof rake.

I haven't tried to move snow from the new house roof. That's just a few years old and built to present code, so I'm not worried.

Another thing to watch out for is snow sliding off roofs. Our garage has a rather steep pitch towards the driveway. We came home from dinner last night to find the entire roof load slid down and dumped in the driveway. Luckily it only hit my plow. It happened a few years ago and flattened my tonneau cover as I was backed in close.

Especially if you have a metal roof. Took the dog out this AM and all the snow on my metal roofed shed came down. Through some physical laws or magic of some sort, it turns to a consistency of concrete when it hits the ground.

Yes, yes it does!
Been working at the snowbanks behind the house with the tractor all week. That area doesn't get much sun so the banks will stay until late May unless it gets really hot. With the regular path to the luge run frozen pretty good, now is the best time to deal with that. Mud season, not so much.

I made sure nobody used the back door as this roof avalanche happens often. I can hear and feel it when it drops!
It drops onto the line of shrubs below. They always look mangled but come back like champions.
A couple years ago it took the chimney down..:laugh:

Thats a picnic table in the center with about a yard of snow on it...

Look out below!

It's a matter of opinion I suppose but I've never heard of a professional roof shoveler. I used to work in construction and know the right and wrong ways to do things, some of these so called professionals I wouldn't want to sharpen a pencil for me. I spent the first year of owning my place fixing things that a so called professional had done to my place.

I'm a do it yourselfer all the way... I don't have the luxury of throwing money at all my problems. Plus if I don't know how to so something I'll buy the right tools and learn to do it myself.

Shoveling off a roof can be done safely and with a little common sense applied no damage will be done. That said I plan to put a metal roof on my place at some point in the next couple of years (yes myself) so it will just slide right off... and never be an issue again.

Years ago I saw a snow crushed front deck on a log home. The metal roof loaded up until it let loose with a mamouth avalanche. This wasn't a covered porch, just a large deck protruding beyond the porch. I'd bet that by now, steps have been taken to moderate this roof's snow activity.

sad news...
 

I just saw on the news, I think somewhere in Mass, A woman was under her carport when it collapsed with the weight of the snow and killed her