Thank goodness no one was hurt, are you going to have to replace the whole chimney? Our old house was built in the 40's and we had to replace a chimney, the mortar was crumbling to pieces so we hired a brick layer to take it down and build a new one. What a mess, they were so covered in powdered mortar they looked like ghosts, needless to say you can imagine the mess the house was in while they were doing the job. We've got a top of the line chimney now, wish we had a house to match :o).

A......

Hi Dotty:

Good pic. I notice your roof is in excellent condition, has it been (re)done in the past few years? Just curious as the roofers probably should have noticed the chimney damage then. It looks like it has been breaking down for several years.

Glad to hear nobody was hurt.

Cheers,
MG

Here is a link that might be useful: Our website

That must have been a real surprise on a quiet August afternoon.

Something must have gone wrong when this was assembled to begin with - my own is 80 years old, has withstood countless coastal storms and in recent years, two earthquakes. If it ever just fell apart on a summer day, I think I'd call ghostbusters :)

I'm sorry you have a repair to deal with between now and Fall....

It was a total shock -- I didn't slam a door, yell or anything! Yes, MG, the roof was replaced last year with wonderful thick old-growth shakes but there was no indication of failure on the chimney. I have a worker coming on Tuesday to take down as much as seems loose and to check the other chimney. The cement slab which is the cap is reinforced concrete and it split in two. I thought it was an earthquake....but maybe ghostbusters are needed?:?

Thankfully, no one was hurt AND it wasn't winter!! Do you actually use the fireplace? I've had a chimney fire so I now have it cleaned and inspected yearly.

Yes, we use this chimney. It has a flue for the fireplace in the kitchen and also for the oil furnace. It was very lucky that no one was hurt. The bricks rained down on a patio that we are having tiled and our tile setter had some of the tiles set out and we were discussing how it looks and the best way to put the design. We were just in the house to have lunch. Some of the tiles were broken, but when you think what could have happened, that is immaterial. Our tile setter does all of the work on our home and he is like family. We had that chimney cleaned last winter and the chimney sweep said it was clean and in good shape. Ghostbusters??

Maybe it was hit by lightning and it just took awhile before the effect was felt? Although I wouldn't necessarily rule out an ectoplasmic event as well :-))

I've lost a couple of bricks off the top of my chimney in last winter's windstorms. They came tumbling down inside the chimney and landed in the fireplace and other than scaring the stuffing out of me, caused no problems. The repair call is on my list of to-dos before winter hits. With a 60+ y.o. house, there is always something that needs to be looked at..........