Roofing in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines

Saint Vincent and the Grenadines combines the volcanic main island of Saint Vincent with a chain of small, low Grenadine islands. Roofs must cope with hurricanes and heavy rain.

Climate and hazards

On 2 July 2024 Hurricane Beryl passed through the southern Grenadines. Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves said roughly nine in ten homes on Union Island were badly damaged or destroyed, and expected similar devastation on Mayreau and Canouan. The OECS code notes that two Eastern Caribbean islands carry volcanic hazards.

Roofing history

Throughout the Eastern Caribbean, older timber houses typically have steep hip or gable roofs clad first in wooden shingles and later in corrugated iron. Hip roofs, sloping on all four sides, are self-bracing and lack tall gable ends that catch the wind, and slopes of about 35 degrees or more are often preferred in hurricane regions because shallower roofs are more prone to uplift.

Codes, standards and regulation

The Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) developed model building codes and guidelines for small buildings with support from UNCHS and UNDP, based on the Caribbean Uniform Building Code (CUBiC). The USAID-funded, OAS-executed Caribbean Disaster Mitigation Project helped Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada and Saint Lucia prepare national codes from these models, and published construction diagrams covering hip and gable roof framing, rafter-to-ring-beam and wall-plate connections and hurricane straps for houses under 3,000 ft² (279 m²). A revised OECS Building Code was issued in June 2015, reviewed that year for Grenada, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Lucia and Montserrat, and drew on the codes of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands. National consultations on administering it were held across the sub-region in 2017 under the EU-funded iLand Resilience project. National consultations on the revised code were held in Saint Vincent in November 2017.

Sources and gaps

Published accounts of island-specific historic roofing: published information is limited.

Roofing history, material statistics and the legal status of the code: published information is limited.