‘Snow is acting like a sponge:' firefighters respond to ‘unprecedented' number of building collapses across Oswego, Oneida counties
SCRIBA, N.Y. (WSYR-TV) — 'Like a crashing, a snapping,' Kelly Darling remembers. 'Really loud noises. Enough to scare me.'
Darling got out of the home she and her late husband built in the early 1990s and called 911.
Once the fire department was there, the sound got worse. The garage came crashing down.
'They got up into the roof and said 'Yeah, damage from years and years of snow,'' Darling said of the firefighter's diagnoses.
Oswego County Fire Coordinator Shane Laws took NewsChannel 9 into the damage.
He showed what's called the gusset plates which are designed to hold truss joints together. The weight of the snow forced them to fail.
Darling's home is one of more than 50 that emergency crews have responded to since Feb. 14. The number in Oneida County is at least 34.
Oswego County called in firefighting help from the State's Division of Homeland Security and Emergency Services.
Deputy State Fire Administration Patrick Hines said, 'One of our members earlier alluded to this as a collapse equivalent of a flash flood. Normally, it's one or two buildings. This is just so many structures all being comprised simultaneously. The volume of work is what strikes me.'
He said the accumulating snow, the thaw and the rain put too much pressure on aging structures.
'Snow is acting like a sponge,' said Hines, 'absorbing all the moisture.'
He added: 'Structures are like the human body. They have a life span. As we get older, we get weaker. Structures are the same way. Repetitive loads over time, the structure can only take it for so long.'
One foot of fluffy snow on a house roof is about the same load as a pick-up truck. Wet snow, like what falls from lake-effect, is the equivalent of three trucks.
The biggest advice from first responders is to evacuate the structure when you hear it creaking or snapping.
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