SNOW LOADS AND STRUCTURAL DESIGN.

The draft for public comment of a new code of practice for snow loads has been issued (86/13528 DC). In recent years there have been several cases of roofs suffering serious structural damage from large quantities of snow. The most serious was probably in South Wales at the beginning of 1982, when several buildings were damaged in blizzard conditions. An investigation by the building Research Establishment (BRE) found that in most cases the roofs had been loaded locally to several times the minimum imposed roof load given in BS 6399 Part 1. The main short-coming in present British design appears to be failure to treat specifically the local drifting of snow caused by the choice of roof geometry.