Building damage issues in tornadoes

The assessment of property damage begins immediately after a tornado. Homeowners, adjusters, engineers, and architects examine buildings and their surroundings to determine the extent of wind and water damage. While catastrophic damage is easy to recognize, the more subtle signs of building distress is not. Many types of building distress that are inherent to the structure are not recognized until after a tornado occurs and are erroneously linked to the storm. The purpose of this paper is to summarize some of the more popular building damage issues witnessed from the author's inspection of thousands of post-tornado damaged structures since 1980 and more specifically from the tornado outbreak in May 2003.