Emergency roof repairs in Blackpool

What to do first

• Move what you can out of the way. Get furniture and anything electrical clear of where water is coming in, and put a container under it.
• If a ceiling is bulging, do not stand under it. A bulge means water is pooling above the plaster. Keep people out of the room and call us.
• Do not go up. Not onto a wet roof, and not up a ladder in wind. Blackpool’s boarding-house stock is three and four storeys, and the Promenade hotels run to five. It is not worth it.
• Photograph it from the ground. Useful for us, and useful for your insurer later.
• Call us and describe what you can see. We can usually tell from the description whether this needs someone tonight or first thing.

Why storm damage arrives in batches here

Blackpool’s roofing problem has never really been rainfall. Met Office long-term averages for Blackpool Squires Gate put annual rain at about 886 mm against a UK figure of about 1,163 mm, with more sunshine than the UK average too. The distinguishing feature of this coast is wind: mean wind speed of about 10.7 knots against a UK average of about 9.3, and five to ten gale days a year on the North West coast against fewer than five at low-lying inland sites, with a prevailing south-westerly arriving off the Irish Sea onto a west-facing shore.

That is why damage here tends to appear all at once after a single bad night rather than creeping up on you. It is also why the phone goes in bursts. The Met Office’s published gust record for a Fylde town is 79 knots — roughly 91 mph — recorded at Fleetwood on 2 January 1976, which gives a sense of what this coast is capable of.

We are not going to tell you how many storms Blackpool gets a year or what wind speed lifts a tile. Nobody publishes reliable figures for either, and the ones you will see quoted elsewhere are guesses.

What we do when we get there

Insurance claims

If you are claiming for storm damage, insurers generally want evidence of what failed and why. We photograph the damage before we touch it, keep a record of the temporary works, and set out the permanent repair in writing so there is something to submit. We will not tell you what your policy covers — that is between you and your insurer — but we will make sure you are not arguing your case with no evidence.

Where we come out to

Blackpool and roughly fifteen miles around it: Bispham, Marton, Layton, South Shore, Squires Gate, Lytham St Annes, Poulton-le-Fylde, Thornton-Cleveleys, Fleetwood, Kirkham, Wesham, Freckleton, Warton, Staining, Singleton, Great Eccleston and Garstang. If you are near the edge of that, ring and ask — we will give you a straight answer rather than keep you waiting.

We are a service-area business without a shop counter, so the phone is the way to reach us. If we are on a roof when you call, leave a message and we will ring back.

After the emergency

A make-safe is exactly that. Once the weather allows, the permanent repair matters — and if the same slope has now failed more than once, it is worth a conversation about whether you are repairing or postponing. Our roof repairs page covers the routine work, and re-roofing covers what happens when repairs have run their course.