SteelMaster Quonset Hut Survives Category 4 Hurricane Michael

There are three words SteelMaster customer Sammy Allen uses to describe his time riding out Hurricane Michael in his Callaway, Florida home: scared to death.

“I’d never been through anything like that. I can promise you I would not go through another one, I would not advise anyone to go through another one,” Sammy said.

Hurricane Michael made landfall as a high-end category 4 hurricane, with maximum sustained winds of 155 mph on October 10. Sammy says he heard there were reports of winds speeds in excess of 175 mph in some areas.

“We’ve gone through some hurricanes, but nothing with this magnitude,” he said.

The hurricane was the third-most Atlantic hurricane to make landfall in the contiguous United States, the strongest storm in terms of maximum sustained wind speed to hit since Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

Many of the homes were flattened or swept away by storm surge and debris blocked the road.

“We didn’t have any TV or power for a couple of weeks. Any picture you see on television doesn’t do it justice,” Sammy said.

Sammy and his wife rode out the storm with his wife in their double-wide trailer they bought years ago. They were able to assess the damage when the eye of the storm came over their area. That’s when he noticed that his 30’ X 40’ SteelMaster garage was still intact.

“It stood up, I have no structural damage as far as the building itself goes.”

Sammy’s had his SteelMaster Quonset Hut for about 12 years.  The garage houses his four valuable show cars: a ‘23 Ford Model T-bucket, a ’72 Chevrolet Camaro Z28, ’69 Convertible Volkswagen and a 2010 SS Chevrolet Camaro.

“I had one [car] that had minor damage, but that was because [the building] shook so hard that I had a ladder that fell and hit the car,” he said. “But it didn’t hurt anything, so I’m thankful for that.”

Sammy was impressed by the durability of his disaster-resistant SteelMaster Quonset Hut. Our prefabricated Quonset Huts are High Velocity Hurricane Zone certified, which is especially important in the state of Florida. The strong, corrugated arch designs are built to stand against the sustained winds of such a storm. The maximum sustained surface winds of a major hurricane are enough to collapse a traditional straight wall building, but over the years and through the decades, SteelMaster’s buildings have continued to survive.

“[The building] withstood all of the wind that I was told it would withstand,” he said. “I would recommend one to anybody. I’m living proof that it will hold the wind.”