On May 7, 3:03*pm, micky wrote:
On Tue, 7 May 2013 04:37:04 -0400, "Robert Green"

wrote:

We had a tornado 5 blocks away a while back and it scattered an entire park
full of tall 2' foot wide oaks like pickup sticks. *If you are in the direct
path of a tornado, no amount of bracing is going to help a typical
residential structure.

Not bracing, but I've heard that attaching the roof well to the top
floor of the house can greatly decrease the chance of the roof coming
off in a tornado. *That most roofs stay on by gravity and the nails
just help. *But where they've learned to use whatever they recommend
now, even in tornadoes the roof will likely stay on.

I guess that depends on what you mean by "in tornadoes".
If it's a tornado passing a couple block or two away, then I agree.
If it's a direct hit or very close, then it's likely going to tear
up the whole house, roof and all.

Using better roof attachment methods has definitely been
proven to make roofs far more wind resistant. That's
been demonstrated in FL, where newer roof work has
greatly increased connection requirements required by
code and it's worked to reduce hurricane damage.