Skiatook Roofing Under Blackjack and Post Oak
Skiatook is the one town in our storm record where the wind blew a metal roof off a building. Metal is not wind-proof. It just fails differently.
A Metal Roof Off a Building, May 2025
On May 24, 2025, a 70 knot storm crossed Skiatook, and the survey records that it "blew the metal roof from a building, and blew down several large trees." Of the eighteen Oklahoma towns we serve, Skiatook is the only one where the storm record documents a metal roof failing outright.
That is worth knowing because metal has a reputation as the roof that wind cannot touch. It is a strong roof, but it does not fail gradually the way shingles do. A shingle roof loses a tab here and a course there. A metal roof holds and holds until the wind gets under an edge, and then it can peel back a whole panel run at once, because the panels are long and the wind has a lot of surface to pull on.
The weak points are predictable. On exposed-fastener panels, the screws back out a little with every swing between summer heat and winter cold, and the rubber washers under them harden and crack. At the eaves and rakes, the trim is what keeps wind from getting under the first panel. On a Skiatook metal roof, those fasteners and edges are what an inspection checks first.
The shingle side of the record is here too. On July 10, 2021, a 56 knot storm "snapped large tree limbs and blew shingles off of a roof." On June 18, 2019, the Oklahoma Mesonet station near Skiatook measured gusts of 71 miles an hour.
Rolling Hills, Oak Canopy, Tallgrass Prairie
The shoreline around Skiatook Lake is documented as "gentle rolling hills of Blackjack and Post Oak trees interspersed with native tallgrass prairie." That one description explains most of what a Skiatook roof deals with.
The oaks are the canopy. Oaks over a roof mean leaves and twigs packed into valleys and gutters, limbs that rub the shingle surface in every breeze, and shade that keeps a slope damp long enough for moss to root. On June 17, 2023, a 65 knot storm "caused extensive tree damage" in Skiatook, which is what happens when a canopy like that meets real wind.
The prairie is the other half. Between the stands of oak are open stretches with nothing to slow the wind down, and a house that faces open ground on a rise takes gusts at full strength. So a Skiatook roof can have both problems at once: tree debris on the sheltered side and wind exposure on the open one.
From a Trading Post on Bird Creek
Cherokee Chief William C. Rogers set up a trading post on Bird Creek in 1872, and the postal designation "Ski-a-took" dates from the same year. The present townsite followed in 1892, and when the Midland Valley Railroad arrived in March 1905, Skiatook incorporated on May 28 of that year. It had 8,450 people at the 2020 Census.
The name is generally traced to Cherokee, translated as "Big-Indian-Me," though a competing account ties it to an Osage trader named Skiatooka. We give both because the sources do.
Around the Lake and the Old Townsite
Skiatook's landmarks are a useful way to describe where the roofing risks change around town.
Skiatook Lake
Skiatook Lake covers 10,500 acres, and open water gives the wind a long, unbroken run. A house facing the lake takes wind that has built up across the water with nothing in its way, and lake air adds humidity that shows on the shaded slopes as algae and moss. On lake-facing roofs, the ridge, the rakes and the windward slope deserve the closest look.
Healing Rock and the Corps of Engineers office
Healing Rock, also called Tepee Rock, is a 12-foot natural stone formation south of the Corps of Engineers office on the lake, with a Native American legend of healing power attached to it. The lakeshore around it is the documented oak-and-prairie country, so a house along that shore gets both problems described above: canopy on one side, open exposure on the other.
West of town
The Battle of Chustenahlah was fought just west of Skiatook on December 26, 1861. If you have a shop, barn or outbuilding with a metal roof anywhere around Skiatook, the May 2025 record makes it the first roof on the property to have checked.
The old townsite and the museum
The Skiatook Museum is housed in the 1912 former residence of the pioneer physician Dr. W.G. Phillips, and the town carries three Oklahoma Historical Society markers. Houses near the old townsite that date from the railroad era have very likely had several roofs, and the work on them should start with what is underneath.
Hail anywhere in town
Skiatook's record holds 34 significant storm events and, alongside them, 25 hail events of an inch or larger, topping out at 1.75 inches in two separate storms, one in 2019 and one in 2026. On a Skiatook metal roof, hail that size dents panels without breaking them, which looks cosmetic until a dent near a seam starts holding water. On a shingle roof, it bruises the mat and strips granules. Either way, it belongs in the same inspection as the wind damage.
Neighbors
We also serve Collinsville, Sperry and Sand Springs from the same Jenks shop.
Free Inspection in Skiatook
Shingle or metal, we will check the edges, fasteners and canopy on your Skiatook roof for free. You get the photos and a straight answer either way.