Fortifying Your Home for a Hurricane Living along the coast is a great way to enjoy the beach. There are many people that love their coastal living and would not trade it for anything but when one lives on the coast it is important to be prepared for a hurricane to ensure that any damage that occurs is minimal.
Get to the Windows First, you want to make sure that you are going to secure all of your windows. Securing the windows in your home will minimize the wind that is able to get into your home and ensure that the hurricane damage that occurs to your home is kept on the outside of your home. When the windows are not going to be secured or fortified, the winds or the debris that fly through the air may crash into the windows and shatter them. Securing the windows with storm shutters is often the best way to keep the wind on the outside of your home. While you are fortifying your home, you may want to look into nailing wood outside of your windows. Some people like to nail the wood on the outside and on the inside of their windows to ensure that they are going to be able to protect themselves with two different layers.
Secure Your Roof Second, many people have seen footage of roofs blowing off in hurricanes. When you live in an area where there are hurricanes you have to be sure that your roof is going to be secure and that the roof is not going to blow off because of the strong winds that are pushing on it. There are simple metal tie-down straps that are used to keep roofs on the building that they have been built for. After you purchase these tie-downs, you can then make sure that you are going to be able to install them when there is a hurricane warning in the area.
Reinforce Everything You Can Third, the garage door is another area of your home that is going to need to be fortified completely. When you are fortifying your garage doors, you should make sure that you invest in a sturdy garage door that is made to stand up and stay strong throughout a storm.
When you need a quick form of reinforcement, you should make sure that you secure to 2x4’s across the inside of your garage door. This will give your door the extra support required to stay strong when strong winds are blowing against your door. There are many people that do not do this, as a result you will see garage door blow into a house during a storm. When this occurs, the home is often going to fill with wind pressure and the strong winds that fill the home can cause permanent and very expensive storm damage. When you understand what needs to be reinforced and how you are going to reinforce it all, you will be able to get the reinforcements up as soon as you know that a hurricane is coming. This way, you can be sure that your home is as secure and safe as possible. Photo Credit: I Am Not I, I Am Not I