Bad jolts in all concrete buildings at night are a real heart thumper. Not only is it dark, but when bits of ceiling concrete drop on your face panic is easy to gain.
Jesus still raises his eyebrows at the extra expense I made forcing 3/4" rebar down hollow cinder bricks in the walls of my new casita. Then filling the columns with pea gravel concrete. The roof gets I-beam supports with Welded rebar thatch then concrete. Different than what is customary. It's called 5-sack concrete north of the border and uses more cement and is not runny. It is a dry mix and it is what is used in dams and bridge abutments. It's about 3-5 times stronger than regular concrete. And the sand is coming from inland -- no salty sand. This is really hard on the budget and on the wallet. But I'll bet it'll be standing proud when the 4 girls have their grandchildren. The concrete is so hard, a special drill called SDS with a diamond drill has a tough time going through it. I cannot shake the images of the Nimitz freeway double-decker collapse in 1989 Oakland CA. That isn't going to be me, playing ham in a ham sandwich.
Now for something useful for more folks.
Avoid parking under a unmaintained coconut palm. It just isn't the 10 pound green nuts that can put huge damage to an RV roof (and solar panels). Brown palm fronds can shatter air conditioner covers, roof vents, TV antennas and rip through rubber roof coating. Every area has a coconut palm harvester whose job it is to harvest nuts, and chop down dead fronds. You'd be wrong to think a palm frond is nothing other than heavy -- a falling frond can kill someone.
