Hailstorms can seriously damage a roof.
Hailstones can bruise or crack roofing shingles, potentially causing water damage to your home.
You can’t always avoid roof damage from hail, but you can minimize the extent of damage by detecting problems early, repairing or replacing your damaged roof as quickly as possible, and installing Class 4, impact-resistant roofing shingles. It’s important to check your roof after a hailstorm. Hail falls in random patterns and may only damage a few houses in a neighborhood, so your roof can be damaged even if your neighbor’s roof is not. Some types of roof damage may not be easy to detect from the ground, so you should get as close as possible to the surface of the roof for a complete inspection. A professional roofing contractor can safely and thoroughly inspect your roof. Most roofers provide free inspections and estimates. Please follow all safety guidelines when inspecting the roof yourself. The first type of damage you want to look for is damage to your roof’s surface. There may be divots, round black areas, bruises, or loss of protective granules. The surface of a roofing shingle may not show all hail damage. Shingles can split when hit by a hailstone and this is only visible if you look at the backside of the roof shingles. Identifying the type of roof damage is crucial so the best action plan can be set up, which may involve warranty and insurance claims. The roofing professional should be able to distinguish hail damage from other types of roof damage such as blistering and cracking, scuffing, wind and debris defacement, and worn out shingles. It can be difficult to determine whether hail damage is just cosmetic or if it will affect the performance of your roof. It is important to fix hail damage to your roofing system as soon as possible to prevent serious water damage to your home. If hail damage has caused granule loss on your roof shingles, it could also affect the performance as well as the aesthetics. Asphalt shingles are protected from UV light degradation by granules. Shingles that have lost granules are more likely to fail prematurely.