From: "geo"
Subject: HURRICANE PROOF BUILDINGS
Date: Tuesday, August 17, 2004 2:20 PM

"Vaughn" wrote in message
...

Wood is an amazing building material. A properly designed wooden
structure
will stand up to a hurricane just as well as a properly designed concrete
structure.

I'm not talking about cinder blocks.

And I am not talking about reinforced concrete dome houses. I am talking
about the real-life code-compliant housing that fills up neighborhoods here in
south Florida. In fact, my post above was not even in response to you, and
certainly not to some weird structure that lives in your imagination or on a on
a web page somewhere.

Last time I checked; here in south Florida, a code-compliant wooden house
will get the same insurance rate for storm coverage as a comparable concrete
home. Proper storm shutters and/or Dade approved window and door systems are a
major item and insurance companies may someday force 100% retrofit in storm
counties. After window protection, the next most important item for storm
resistance is roof design, not the building material of the walls.

Ten years ago, I toured hurricane Andrew's devastation and saw many failed
structures, wood, concrete block, and yes; even reinforced concrete.


Vaughn (a guy who lives in a concrete house)