Trajectories of roof sheathing panels under high winds

A 1:20 scale, aeroelastic “failure” model of a house was used to evaluate the flight mechanics of a scaled 1.2 m×2.4 m (4 ft×8 ft) roof sheathing panel in a scaled, open country, turbulent boundary layer. The panel was held to the model house with electromagnets which applied scaled restraining forces. The initial failure mechanism and the trajectory of the panel in flight were captured with high-speed digital video. For nominally similar initial conditions, different modes of flight were observed including purely translational and auto-rotational modes. These two modes lead to distinctly different lengths of flight and to different flight speeds, with the auto-rotational mode yielding higher speeds over greater distances.