Experts recommend removing roof snow to prevent leaking

With warmer weather – possibly as high as 45 degrees – predicted for this weekend, snow removal experts are recommending that homeowners remove the snow that has accumulated on roofs.

The frozen blanket of snow is likely to begin to melt with the warmer temperatures, causing water damage, especially around windows.

“Do it now because if it warms up it’s going to start leaking,” Archie Maloon, owner of Maloon Builders from Dover-Foxcroft, said Thursday. “If you wait for it to leak, it’s going to come into your house and it’s going to cause damage.

“You have to get the source of the water off the roof,” he stressed.

When that moving water freezes at night, it can create ice dams, which can cause water backup and more leakage, said Maloon, who has 25 years of experience building homes and with snow and ice removal.

Once these ice dams form, the melted snow that pools up behind them can push up roof shingles and create leaks that enter homes and damage them, he said.

Brewer residents Carroll Ellingwood, who is a full-time self-employed snow remover during the winter, and Mark Lawson, a 37-year veteran carpenter who over the years has seen his share of cleaning snow off roofs, also recommended that the snow be dislodged.

“A lot of people are having roofs that are leaking” this year, said Ellingwood, who is getting about 20 calls daily. “They [homeowners] probably should get it off now before ice dams [form].”

“It [snow] should be removed,” Lawson added, saying that people who own trailers should take extra precautions because “there is less support in the roof.”

Removing snow from the top of a roof is a sometimes dangerous and always physically demanding job, said Maloon who has local work crews cleaning off roofs for residents and businesses all over the Bangor-Dover-Foxcroft area.

There are dangers of injury from lifting heavy snow, from falling off slippery roofs or ladders and from ice falling on those removing snow, he said, adding that there have been a few scary moments over the last 21/2 decades.

“You really need to pay attention,” Maloon said. “Some of these roofs are very steep and very high. You’ve got to be careful.”

Given the near-record snowfall at the end of December and this week’s snowstorm, the job of removing snow from roofs is a bigger job than normal.

“It’s definitely an old-fashioned winter in Maine,” Maloon said.

In December, roughly 42 inches of snow fell in the Bangor area, well over the normal level of about a foot, and greatly surpasses last year’s total of 21/2 inches.

Tuesday’s storm left an additional 8-10 inches on the ground locally, adding to the problem.

Any doctor probably would say the number of patients complaining of back and muscle injuries drastically increases whenever there is a big snowstorm.

Numerous offices were contacted Thursday, but none returned calls for advice. A quick check of the Service Master Web site turned up the reason for snow shoveler’s back pain: “This is primarily because people don’t use good technique.”

“Be sure to lift with your legs instead of your back,” the Web site advises. “By doing so, your chances of sustaining a painful injury drop substantially.”

Maloon said good snow removal equipment is also crucial to lessening the workload. He suggests a plastic roof rake and, if ice dams form, heat tape to keep the water moving off roofs.

“Heat tape: It really does work quite well,” he said. As for roof rakes, “Don’t ever use metal on a roof. Metal is unforgiving. Plastic is more flexible.”

Snow rakes have long handles, which enable homeowners to remove snow from their roofs without having to climb up there, thus preventing injuries from falling. The work is still laborious, he said.

For roofs with a high pitch, removing the bottom 3 or 4 feet of snow will often prevent ice dams. If ice dams do form, and heat tape is not a viable option, Maloon suggests cutting a path for the water to flow.

“The wider the better,” he said. “It you only cut a 2-inch path, it will fill up the first time. You have to cut a good 8- to 10-inch path.”

With this weekend’s warmer weather, which is predicted to last through the beginning of next week, Maloon expects to get a lot of calls from homeowners experiencing leaky roofs.

“Things are going to happen this weekend,” he said. “People’s roofs are going to start leaking. It’s the thawing and freezing, thawing and freezing that creates the [ice] dams.”