My home backs up against a 200'-wide high-voltage power line easement. After
Ike, looking across this field, I can see maybe thirty fences knocked down
by the high winds. Every one of these downed fences was erected using wooden
posts.

On my side of the field - for reasons passing understanding - every one of
the fences remained intact and every one of the fences was erected using
metal poles.

In the interests of full disclosure, we did have one break on our fence; the
wind, using the pickets as a sail, fractured one cross-member, but the poles
on either side of the fracture remained upright.

Maybe the construction technique using the wooden posts was flawed, I can't
say for sure. But the metal post method survived the storm and the wooden
posts didn't.