Mississippi tornado reignites push for mobile home safety
- 22M Americans in mobile homes are at the highest risk for storm damage
- Experts say mobile homes can be built to better withstand severe weather
- The first federal regulations for mobile home safety didn’t come until 1976
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ROLLING FORK, Miss. (NewsNation) — Amid the clean up after the devastating tornado in Rolling Fork, there is a renewed push across the country to upgrade the stability of mobile homes — a type of affordable living situation for an estimated 22 million Americans.
Officials have reported that dozens of mobile homes in the area were no match for the rare “long track” tornado, which has been preliminary estimated to be an EF-4.
Ian Giammanco, who oversees building codes and testing for the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety research center, told NewsNation these homes come with unique safety concerns during severe weather. When they’re not anchored properly, they can roll — sometimes more than 50 feet.
“When you look at the combination of what happened in Mississippi, this chain of events was set 30 and 40 years ago,” he said of many of the mobile home designs in Rolling Fork.
Contrary to popular belief, Giammanco says a roof flying off during a storm isn’t the most dangerous scenario.
“This includes even site-built homes that may not have proper anchoring on the wall … the foundations. If those fail first, guess what collapses on top of you? If you’re inside, the entire roof system,” he said.
Franco Perez has spent his entire career selling mobile homes in California. He told NewsNation that many of the homes are now being made with safety in mind.
“A lot of the improvements are really in the improved materials, how they’re being constructed,” Perez said. “To have a weather-resistant exterior, we have fiber cement exteriors. We also have steel I-beam frames underneath the home and very reinforced walls.”
The safety evolution, however, came slowly in the U.S. The first federal codes didn’t come until 1976 and were not updated again until the 1990s. They were upgraded once again in 2021.
“If you look at say something like Hurricane Ian — and that just happened — we saw great performance out of some of those newer manufactured homes,” said Giammanco. “They were well-anchored and they had all the features that engineering has brought to bear.”
Older mobile homes can have their roofs retrofitted, but experts agree the number one priority is the anchoring.
According to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), damage to mobile homes occurs predominantly when anchors are placed too far apart, or not deep enough in sandy soil. In those cases, the anchors can erode over time.
