Just three days before this post, a very precarious thunderstorm had hit the Midwest and South. This thunderstorm spawned tornadoes in Missouri and Texas and slammed several other states with large hail and heavy rain that prompted a handful of water rescues.
Storms came down the hardest in the city of Denton, a North Texas College town. They had hail as large as baseballs which caused broken windows and plenty of other damage. The National Weather Service reported that there was hail in Tulsa, Oklahoma the size of ping pong balls and extremely strong wind gusts.
Two things happen here that should cause you to get going and meet the immediate needs of those that have suffered from these horrible storms. You will find the obvious damage the hail caused; keep in mind that if the hail, especially the baseball sized ones, pummeled a car, you may not be able to fix those dents. Sometimes these type of dents will make a car look as if it had been in a horrific accident. You need to be willing to turn a customer away explaining that this is a body shop repair, not a PDR repair. Perhaps it would be wise to have created some brochures describing why you can’t work with some dents. If you have these brochures, you can quickly hand it off the the car owner and go to the next car. Putting up a 10×10 tent in an approved area, you can take in cars one at a time. You don’t have the time to explain to everyone why their car doesn’t meet the PDR Technology criteria.
You will need to put together a “Thunderstorm Checklist” so that you are prepared to meet the demands of these customers. Part II will have such a checklist that you can use and have ready for thunderstorm/hailstorm season.