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What a Dog on a Roof Can Teach Us All About Roof Safety

By now, thousands of people feel that they know Huckleberry, a sprightly golden retriever who captured the heart of the Internet because of the peculiar place he likes to perch—on the rooftop of his owners’ Austin, TX, home.

The first person to tweet a photo of Huck on the roof was neighbor Sarafina Nance.

“I was on a walk with my puppy, and we were a couple blocks away from my apartment, and my puppy kept pulling on the leash and looking up,” Nance told ABC News. “And I finally looked up, and I saw this dog looking down on me from this roof.”

Surprised and slightly confused, Nance went to knock on the home’s front door to alert Huck’s owners, only to find out they already knew about their pet’s odd behavior. In the window was a sign that said, ‘Huckleberry … learned how to jump onto our roof from the backyard. We appreciate your concern but please do not knock on our door … we know he’s up there!”

After Nance’s tweet took off and Huck’s fame grew, the dog’s owners started an Instagram account (which now boasts 18,700 followers) dedicated to all things #hucktheroofdog, including a video of how Huck makes his way on top of the house (the 3-foot clearance between the backyard and the roof makes the leap easy for a dog his size).

“It took him about six months to figure out the roof was an extension of his backyard,” the dog’s owner Allie Burnitt explained to ABC News. “He now goes up every single time we let him outside.”

For those concerned about Huck’s safety, rest assured his owners never let him in the backyard unless someone’s home. Plus, as Leo Biyevetskiy of roofing website RoofingCalculator.org points out, “It’s pretty safe because the roof slope is shallow.”

What Huck can teach the rest of us about roof safety

Huck likes to perch on the roof for fun, but homeowners are more likely to climb up there to take care of maintenance tasks.

“Someone might go on their roof to clean gutters or windows, get a ball, install a chimney cap, remove a fallen branch, string Christmas lights—there are lots of reasons a homeowner might find him or herself on the roof,” says Mark Clement, a contractor at MyFixItUpLife.com.

But stepping on a roof can be a risky bet: According to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, falls account for over one-third of the deaths in construction—and those are professionals! That doesn’t bode well for regular old homeowners who are heading up there once in a blue moon to fix a leak or clean the leaves out of those gutters.

As such, it’s essential that people take every precaution to ensure they won’t fall and seriously injure themselves. If you’re heading on up, take a tip or two from experts on how to stay safe.

• Watch the pitch. If you’re going to climb on your roof, Clement says you must make sure the roof pitch—the degree of steepness—is walkable. “The roof pitch on Huckleberry’s house looks like a three-pitch, or 14 degrees, the equivalent of walking up a shallow hill,” says Clement. If your roof is a five-pitch—22.5 degrees—or steeper, it’s not safe to walk on, says Biyevetskiy.
• Use the right ladder. Your ladder should extend three rungs past the edge of the roof where you transition from the ladder to the building, says Clement. Otherwise, getting off and on will be much more difficult and dangerous. “A lot of people make the mistake of using a ladder that gets up to the edge of the roof, not past it,” he explains. “And getting onto the ladder is not the hardest part—it’s getting down.”
• Use a ladder stabilizer. Unstable ladders are one of the leading causes of injuries sustained by homeowners trying to clean their gutters, Biyevetskiy explains. So if you plan on using a ladder to get on your roof, consider buying a stabilizer. It will set you back about $25 and makes it almost impossible for a ladder to slip and fall sideways. “The stabilizer should be placed on the edge of the roof just above gutters, or against the wall just below gutters,” says Biyevetskiy.
• Wear the right shoes. For scaling a roof, always wear good running sneakers, as those provide the best grip, says Biyevetskiy. As obvious as it may sound, you should never wear sandals.
• Don’t climb on a metal, slate, or tile roof. If your house’s roof is made of metal, slate, or tile, avoid walking on it at all costs. “Metal and slate roofs are very slippery, and slate roofs are usually steep, which makes them very difficult to walk on,” Biyevetskiy says. “Tile and slate roofs are also dangerous to walk on because they can break under your feet, and then falling is almost inevitable.”

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