As anyone who has lived in a northern state can attest to, if you don't shovel your roof off in the winter, you risk a collapse. If your roof is sturdy enough, or you are fortunate enough, that it doesn't collapse from the weight of the snow, you will face the risk of ice damming, and subsequent leaking. We had a metal roof put on our house a few years ago, which solves these problems very well. However, we had already replaced the shingles on the back part of the house, now a library, which was added onto the house at some point before we bought it. Since the roof was new, we didn't replace it with a metal roof. That was a mistake. Now, the snow slides off the metal roof onto the shingled roof and stays there. Until the past couple of years, that was an inconvenience but not a problem because that part of the roof isn't particularly steep, so I could just climb up there on a ladder and shovel it. I hated doing it but it had to be done. However, while I don't feel particularly unsteady on my feet, the last time I shoveled the roof I kept worrying that I would slip and fall. One of my feet slipped momentarily, and I caught myself without difficulty, but now I'm afraid to go up on the roof. I have never been afraid of heights and it's not all that high. It's only about eight feet at the lower end. If I could ever remember to move stuff away from the house in the fall, while it's still possible to move stuff around, I would be falling a short distance into the snow, so there wouldn't be a huge danger. But I never remember to do that, so I'd be falling onto lawn furniture and other stuff that I had put out there in the hope of coming across a truck so that I could haul it off to the transfer station. I wouldn't kill myself, but that could hurt. This morning, I dug the ladder out from the snow and put it up against the house. From the top of the ladder, I was able to get the snow off the roof for the distance that I could reach with the shovel, which was probably enough to keep the roof from collapsing, but it wouldn't necessarily help with the ice damming. Temperatures are supposed to be well below freezing tonight and there were about three feet of snow that I couldn't reach. I made one attempt to climb onto the roof but the ladder started slipping, so I backed off and called someone to come shovel the roof for me, although I hate paying for things that I should be able to do for myself. My legs still work. I can run up and down the stairs, I can still touch my toes without bending my knees, and I regularly walk around town. I'm just scared to get onto the roof.
We are fortunate that we have several Amish families as neighbors. We hire a couple of kids to clean it. Luckily this year we have not had the need.
Better safe than sorry, Ken. You did the smart thing by paying someone to remove the snow. One thing about getting older is the ability to realize that we are no longer invincible like when we were young.
That's true. Ten years ago, even if I fell and broke a leg it wouldn't have been that big of a deal, but we don't heal as easily when we near seventy.
When we lived at home, my brother would have to shovel it off the roof of the back solarium. For some reason, the rest of the house was fine.
Probably a steeper pitch, which isn't as much of a problem. I have something like a 30-degree pitch on the shingled part of my house, which is why the snow doesn't slide off.