Forensics and Storm Damage

One topic I haven't really had a chance to cover yet is storm damage. Storm damage can be detrimental when the damage is widespread over a large community or town. One other thing that storm damage can produce, however, is insurance fraud. A lot of times, especially involving hail damage, storms can produce odd patterns of areas that have no damage even sometime being across the street from homes that are severely damaged. What this lends to is insurance companies being targeted by blanket claims that can be terrible for business.

I remember a buddy of mine (He is a Forensic Engineer) telling me about a case he investigated where a particular home owner had filed a claim for hail damage on his roof. What initially tipped off the insurance company was the wrong date of the storm on the claim, and an adjuster was promptly sent out. Unable to accurately assess the damage, my friend was called in to give his expert opinion. What he found was a rather strange scenario on the roof. He told the story better than I can, but he was basically shocked to find that this area of the state apparently produced flat-bottomed hail that was the exact same diameter in every indentation, and further it refused to damage the other side of the roof. A brief search of the yard found the culprit, and unfortunately the hammer did not carry insurance, and after this incident neither did the homeowner.

So what we find is that by spending $1500 to pay for a professional opinion, an insurance company saved $15,000 on a roof the did not need to replace. Either that or maybe they need to spend a little more on a more observant adjuster.

Bill Mahan

More Fire Investigation Information!

So the last post seemed to be fairly popular as I received a lot of emails about what kind of reasons lead to fires and fire damage. Another thing I wanted to add about the destruction that fire causes is that it spreads well beyond what is in direct contact with heat and flame. The smoke produced from burning drywall, paper, and other combustibles can cause major damage as well. The smoke itself can discolor paint, ruin carpet, leave ash on ceiling tiles, and worst of all ruin anything remotely absorbent by tarnishing the smell. Fire investigators from reputable forensic engineering firms can do an excellent job of determining exactly why a particular fire occurred, something necessary when stakes are high.

Was it the remote starter installed in the car that malfunctioned or the vehicle itself?

It is these kinds of questions that require forensic engineers!!

Bill Mahan

Fire Investigations

One of the more common jobs a Forensic Engineer may encounter is carrying out a fire investigators. Fire investigations can be requested for a number of different reasons, all of course involving a fire. Requirements for the services of a forensic engineer are usually as follows:

- Large Fire
- Fire in an Urban Setting
- Fire that resulted in Death or Injury
- Fire that is product of a technical or mechanical failure
- Fire that caused property damage

These different scenarios all cause some sort of courtroom battle that requires the use of an expert. The Forensic Engineer(s) who works the investigation may even be called upon as an expert witness. In this case, the Engineer must trust his own judgment based on know-how of Engineering Rules and Scenarios to ensure that his opinion is trusted and founded in logic.

Bill Mahan

Main Goals/Topics of Discussion

The goals of forensic engineers tend to range from simplistic to complex, as with most disciplines of forensic science. They can hope to discover when something happened, how something happened, the sequence of events up to the accident, or all three. The group that moderates and maintains a basis for these engineers is the ASTM, who determines the proper course of action required to ensure an accurate investigation.

So for the breakdown we have:
- Determine Origin
- Determine Cause
- Determine Preceding Events

All of these can be quite essential investigation topics, especially when dealing with high-profile cases. Some popular cases that involved the use of a forensic engineering firm include the accident that killed Princess Diana.

Bill Mahan