Flying roof wrecks kitchen in Siglufjörður home

A roof torn off an industrial building smashed into a house in Siglufjörður during a severe storm, destroying the kitchen and causing extensive damage, mbl.is reported. The homeowner, Ásta Gunna Kristjánsdóttir, was travelling north to salvage valuables from the property.

The roof hit the house’s gable, damaged its supporting structure and destroyed a windbreak fence. A heavy bed in a bedroom was pushed between half a metre and a metre across the floor.

“The kitchen is completely ruined, and everything in it,” Ásta Gunna told mbl.is. A refrigerator tipped over, with its door ending up in another room, and the washing machine was smashed. The electricity was shut off, but she said she did not know whether the water had also been turned off or whether water had entered the house.

Ásta Gunna and her husband live in Hafnarfjörður and have owned the Siglufjörður house for 13 years. They try to visit at least once a month. She said she might have been standing at the stove when the roof hit, adding that it was fortunate nobody was hurt.

She said many residents were unhappy that they had not been warned the weather would be so severe. Roofs were blown off three houses in the town, she said.

The couple are in contact with their insurance company. Ásta Gunna said natural disaster insurance might cover some of the damage, as it did when the same house was flooded several years ago after a river overflowed.

Despite the damage, she joked that it could be the “third lottery win” for her husband. The day before the storm, he had won 30,000 krónur in a lottery and then received notice that he had also won in a scavenger hunt in Hafnarfjörður.