7 Engineer Recommendations for Safe Deck Construction

The deck collapse injury attorneys at Denena Points, PC emphasize that deck failure accidents and the resulting injuries are 100% preventable. After a deck is built, thorough, twice-yearly inspections and regular maintenance can help prevent a collapse accident. But careful design and construction, with inspections during the building process, are essential elements in ensuring future deck safety for you, your family, and guests at your home. Frank Woeste and Joseph Lofersky of Virginia Tech have written an in-depth report on deck safety, from which we extract a few of their recommendations:

1. Decks and other outdoor structures should be designed and built as a unified system of interrelated components rather than as a collection of individual parts.

2. The architect and specificer must be diligent when specifying decks, porches, or balconies and their guardrails. These structures almost always require expertise in waterproofing specifications and details to prevent their later failures from rot caused by moisture seepage.

3. The connection of the band joist to the deck joist should be secured with through bolts rather than with nails or screws placed in the end grain of the joists.

4. Proper screw and bolt installation and spacing must be considered and followed in securing the deck to the house.

5. The type of lumber and posts used in the deck needs to be carefully considered because modern wood treatments often cause faster corrosion of connection hardware than older treatments.

6. Decks need to be built with proper flashing that will protect the house from rot caused by moisture seepage through the connections to the deck.

7. Deck guards need to be built to proper IRC and local requirements to support at least a 200-pound load applied in any direction.

See the report, Structural Safety of Wood Decks and Deck Guards, by Joseph R. Lofersky, PhD and Frank E. Woeste, PE, PhD, 11/2013, for more information on safe deck specifications.