How to Inspect Your Roof After a Storm: A 30-Minute Safety Check

High winds rarely announce the damage they've done. You go to bed with the fence intact and wake up to find a ridge tile in the flowerbed and a damp patch spreading across the landing ceiling. Before you reach for a ladder, take a breath. Almost everything useful you need to know about your roof after a storm can be learned in half an hour, standing safely on the ground and poking your head into the loft.

This is a check, not a repair. Its job is to tell you whether you have a problem worth a phone call, and to give you enough detail that the roofer who turns up knows what they're dealing with.

Start with a slow lap of the house

Walk the full perimeter, and walk it slowly. Stand back from each corner — ten or fifteen metres back if you have the space — and look up along the ridge line. What you're looking for is anything that breaks the pattern: a tile sitting proud of its neighbours, a dark gap where a course has shifted, a length of ridge that has come loose.

Binoculars make a real difference. So does a phone camera with a decent zoom, which has the advantage of giving you dated photographs you can send to a roofer or an insurer later.

Work around the building in the same order each time so you don't miss a side:

• Ridge and hips — the top lines of the roof. Lifted or missing ridge tiles are the classic storm casualty.
• Verge and eaves — the edge tiles along the gable and above the gutter. Look for gaps, and for tiles sitting at a different angle from their neighbours.
• Gutters and downpipes — check for pieces of broken tile, crumbs of mortar or grey grit washed down. Mortar in the gutter usually means the ridge or the pointing above it has failed.
• Flashing — the lead or metal strips around the chimney, where the roof meets a wall, and in the valleys where two slopes meet. Look for it lifting, tearing or pulling away.
• Anything bolted on — aerials, satellite dishes, solar panels, chimney pots. If they've shifted, they can be the source of a leak even when the roof covering itself is fine.

What damage looks like from the ground

Fresh damage is usually lighter or darker than the roof around it. A slipped tile exposes the felt or battens underneath, which shows up as a rectangular patch that doesn't match. Cracked mortar around ridge tiles tends to leave a pale, ragged line where there was once a neat edge.

On flat roofs — garages, extensions, dormers — look at the edges and the joints. Wind gets under a lifted corner of felt or membrane and peels it back, and that's often visible from a first-floor window without any climbing at all. If you can see the roof of an extension from an upstairs bedroom, use it. It's the safest viewing platform you have.

Check the outside of the chimney too

Chimney stacks take the worst of the wind. Look for missing pots, cracked render, mortar joints that have opened up, and a flashing that has come away at the base. Water getting in around a chimney often shows up as damp on the chimney breast inside the house, sometimes a long way below the roof line.

Then go into the loft

Five minutes up here can save you weeks of misery, because most storm leaks announce themselves in the loft long before they reach your ceiling.

1. Go up in daylight and switch the loft light off. Stand still and let your eyes adjust. Any pinprick of daylight through the roof covering is a hole.
2. Take a torch and look along the underside of the roof, working from one end to the other.
3. Check the battens and the felt. Wet or dark-stained timbers, drips, or water tracking along the underside of the membrane all point to a breach above.
4. Look at the chimney breast and any party wall for staining or damp patches.
5. Check the insulation for compressed, sodden patches — water often runs down and pools there.

Two cautions. Walk only on joists or on boards laid down for the purpose; a plasterboard ceiling is not built to be stepped on. And if you find water anywhere near a light fitting, cable or junction box, keep clear of it and have an electrician look before you use that circuit again.

Remember that water rarely lands where it gets in. A drip three metres from the chimney could easily be entering at the flashing beside it, running along a batten and dropping further down the slope.

Signs you should call a roofer today

Some things can wait for a dry, calm day. These can't:

• Water coming through a ceiling, or a bulge in the plaster where water is collecting behind it.
• Missing, cracked or slipped tiles anywhere, especially where a gap is visible from inside the loft.
• Lifted or torn flashing around a chimney, dormer or valley.
• Loose ridge or hip tiles — they can fall, and they let in a lot of water.
• Any area you can't see properly but suspect is damaged.

Don't put a ladder up and go for a look yourself, however tempting it is. Storm-damaged roofs are unpredictable, weathered tiles crack underfoot, and a fall from roof height is a serious matter. Leave the climbing to someone who does it for a living and is insured to do it.

Finding and briefing a roofer

After a big storm, plenty of people will knock on your door offering to fix the roof. Some are genuine local tradespeople; some are not. Take your time. Ask for a written quote, check that the company has a fixed address and can show proof of insurance, and be wary of anyone who wants the full amount up front or who pressures you into a decision on the doorstep.

When you do ring someone, have your photographs ready and be specific: which side of the house, roughly how many tiles, whether the flashing has moved, whether you've seen water inside. That saves a wasted visit and lets you compare quotes for the same job.

Protect the inside while you wait

You can't safely stop a leak from the ground, but you can limit the damage. Move furniture and anything valuable out from under the affected area, put buckets and towels down, and don't prod at a bulging ceiling — a small hole made deliberately by a professional is safer than a ceiling that comes down on its own. Keep the heating steady rather than blasting it, which helps damp plaster dry without cracking.

Photograph everything: the roof, the gutters, the ceiling stains, any damaged belongings. Dated pictures make an insurance claim far easier to process, and they take two minutes to collect.

Make it a habit

Ten minutes with binoculars and twenty in the loft, once after every named storm, is enough to catch most problems while they're still small. Note anything that looks slightly off in your phone, even if you decide not to act on it yet — a tile that has shifted a centimetre this winter may be gone by the next one. If anything looks structural, or you're unsure what your insurance policy covers, speak to a qualified roofing professional or your insurer before deciding what to do.

Photo: mrjerryjm / Pixabay