The fun of Floods, just ask me and Sarge

So, I haven't been around in a few days.

It all started Friday night, had fun doing fnf, but then I did something crazy. I reinstalled sim city 4. I played sim city, saturday and saturday night. Then sunday after 5 days of rain my basement sprung a leak. not just a baby leak, but 200+ gal/ hr leak. Monday morning I found I couldn't make it to work because all roads to work were washed away. Mon afternoon the fire dept came around to tell my wife and I we were in a mandatory evacuation area and we needed to evacuate to a lower in elevation place that was closer to the rising river, and ooo by the way the leak in my house was worse at this point. Since a large portion of my town was underwater my wife and i decided we needed a place to stay for a few days. Minutes later we packed the cats and headed to my in-laws. we stayed there 2 nights, with me panic'd and my cats pissed off about the change in their living situation. during this time I had the 29th birthday that has been depressing me for a month. today I returned to my home despite it still being an evac area and had the fun task of tearing out carpet and get to look forward to replacing the drywall I put in last year.

In any case, sim city 4 is more fun than I remember. and at least I didn't have 3 kids to entertain during this. :-)

ooo if you'd like to see pics, http://www.seacoastonline.com/ they have pics of the whole region, seems my town got it the worst, I am in Newmarket. My town and york beach are the ones that have been on the news.

Oh man..... Bubba, I am really sorry to hear this hit you so hard.... If you need anything, let me know....

Hope you and Sarge stay dry, and nothing that can't get dried out gets soaked at your house.

A couple years ago, rains from a hurricaine swept thru Pittsburgh, and it JUST WOULD NOT STOP. A lot of things got submerged, and Paladin still has a mound of rocks in his lower front yard to remind him how far the water from his creek rose that day. . .entire buildings came down as the water ate away the soil under their foundations. A house across the street from Paladin decided to migrate. . .

Hope none of that stuff hits you guys, and you come out of this relatively unscathed.

No it seems the worst is over. scary and an eye opener, but we both came out unscathed. I just wanted to let you all know where I have been

Definitely the worst is over.

First picture is Sunday mid-afternoon. The river that forms the back line of my property is usually beyond that tree in the center of the picture and about 5 feet down. The river peaked around 12:30 or 1:00 am very close to the house. I was getting water coming in through a seam between the basement slab and the walls, but I was able to contain it by staying right on it with a shop-vac. By about 4:30 AM water had stopped coming in and I was able to go to sleep while my wife kept an eye on things.

Second picture is from Monday morning. The water had reached right up to the bricks that are right behind the neighbors ducks. They hung out in my yard most of the morning. Another 6 inches of depth and I would have had a great deal of water in the basement.

WOW!

Wow Sarge you live THAT close to the river??? Man that is just crazy! 😉

Seriously I am sorry you guys had to go through that. That always sucks HARD. I never understood these things until I actually had a house then went through something similar. I am lucky in some ways but there are things I am not happy about.

I have a small creek that runs in front of the house but has flooded a few times. I cannot really put anything down there in the lower yard because of this. Lucky for me though the creek is in a small valley that it has to get high enough before it tops over onto my lower yard. The road in front of the house is about a mile long to the bottom and has a nice incline to it. I live in the middle of this road so water tries to keep going down the road. The main problem is all the water from the streets/rain etc… from across the street gets funneled under the road and into my creek. Then all the water from my side also gets into my creek. The creek does keep going following the road through everyone’s property but it figures that it is my house that the water from across the way gets funneled into. ;(

I am lucky though as there is a hill between the lower yard and the flat parts starts the upper yard where the house is so I have some protection. The water would have to rise several feet before it got to my house.
So I am not complaining at all.

When Pittsburgh had the floods that September it was the worse it ever was. The water came up half way or more of that hill. I got a lot of rocks that got deposited into my lower yard from the creek. I guess from everyone’s yards up the road. I never did anything with them; they are sinking into my yard as time goes on. I will post some pictures when I can.


We did have a lot of water in the basement that night though but that was from the rain gutters pouring onto this one spot where rain somehow worms its way in. It was a very long night with buckets trying to keep up on it. I since bought a wet vac with a pump feature so I can connect a garden hose on it and pump water outside if need be. Wish I had it that night. I now keep plastic on that spot under that gutter and it seems to prevent water from worming in. Live and learn I guess… 😉

Yeah, the river is that close. Usually it is very small - maybe 10-15 ft across at the widest point and 3-4 feet deep. My house is probably a good 10 feet in elevation above the river and in the six years that we have lived there, this is only the second time it has come over it's banks on our side (the first time made it about to where our fence is). Across the river from our property is a large wetland that is lower than we are so the river expands that direction first and it takes a whole lot of water to bring it over the banks on our side.

I have worked to make the drainage at my house better and move water away from the foundation, and that paid off big time with this storm. I had a tiny bit of wetness in one area that used to get puddles during big storms, and just the relatively small amount coming through the seem as I posted earlier. Many of my neighbors weren't as fortunate getting from a few inches to 2 ft of water in their basements.


BTW, Happy Birthday Bubba! (a bit late I know)

Those ducks didnt say anything along the lines of... AFLACK!!!

Take it Flood insurance will take care of ya?

ECB wrote:Take it Flood insurance will take care of ya?

Don't have it and don't need it this time 🙂

Flood insurance is wicked expensive and real limited in coverage. This was a 100+ year storm and it still didn't (quite) make it to my house so I think I am relatively safe. Worst thing that could happen to me is damage to my basement which while bad, wouldn't be catastrophic for us. To get into our living area it would have to gain another 10 feet or so of depth, and that just isn't going to happen without some sort of doomsday catastrophy and in that case we are probably f*cked for a lot of reasons 😄

Paladin, you ever need a paddle, just let me know....

Bubba, happy birthday man.... That's not a bad one, so don't sweat it.... I just had my 34... It's the first time I've ever been bothered by a birthday.... Still, it's good to be alive, even if I am an old fart now.... ;-)