A gentleman called me the other night in a panic about his plaster ceiling collapsing. My first thought was, is anyone injured? A plaster ceiling can weigh thousands of pounds and can cause significant damage and injuries when it falls to the floor! This is why it is important to address plaster bulges that appear on your ceilings with relative urgency, especially if they develop cracks!
Thankfully no one was injured!
The homeowner described it as a very loud bang. It was also an instant drop with no warning. (A member of the household was in the room when this occurred.) The following photo was sent to me via text.
The piece that fell off the ceiling, measured approximately 18″ wide by 3 feet long. In a situation like this, its imperative that anything that is breakable, be removed from the room. The amount of plaster that came off by hand, was quite substantial. We disassembled the light fixture, and carefully removed the loose plaster from around the light first. After that, we carefully and methodically removed the loose plaster from the ceiling. The image below shows how low the ceiling was hanging,
Below is how much we removed. Its important not to hit this with a hammer as that would potentially destabilize the rest of the plaster. Care must be taken to ensure we don’t inadvertently destabilize the rest of the ceiling which is relatively easy to do.
Plaster bulges can be very deceiving and can open up massive sized holes. What started out as a large size plaster bulge 2 feet wide by 4 feet long, turned into a hole 7 feet wide by 8 feet long. Our recommendation for this homeowner is to hire a local company to hang a new drywall ceiling, as they are outside of our service area. We reached out to a couple of colleagues of ours to get them squared away with a reputable drywall contractor.
The lesson learned here is that once a plaster bulge cracks its only a matter of time before it hits the floor. There will be no warning as to when that occurs.
Repairing plaster bulges before they detach from a ceiling can by expensive. This has to do with the fact that as you can see from the above photos, while the initial damage appears rather straight forward, the amount of actual damage can be substantial. For the inexperienced this often results in expensive change orders for the homeowner, or the homeowner can’t find anyone that wants to take on the job.
Author’s Suggested Reading:
- Plaster Ceiling Collapse and Restoration in Kenmore NY – January 19, 2026
The rocklath plaster ceiling in these homeowners’ living room collapsed on 1/9/26. Prior to the collapse large cracks appeared running down the center of the ceiling… - Plaster Ceiling Replacement in Snyder NY – October 20, 2025
What began as a ceiling repair, turned into a ceiling replacement in Snyder NY. Plaster bulges that are showing worsening cracks, crumbling, and large deflections like seen in the photos below is an evolving situation that requires immediate attention… - Emergency Ceiling Replacement in Williamsville – August 18, 2025
While we can repair most ceilings, sometimes they are beyond repair and are actually a danger to the occupants of the home….
