We've had a very grey and soggy winter thus far in Seattle. Yesterday and today it poured, even by Seattle standards. In fact, according to KING5, Sea Tac recorded a new daily maximum of 2.20" of rain today. 35th Avenue NE, the main north/south thoroughfare by my residence, was closed this morning because water from the creek, a half mile north of me had overrun the road.
What this meant for me, was that my youngest son texted me at church to inform me that the basement had flooded. Up the hill next door to my house, are two Hong-Kong size houses that went up 3 or 4 years ago. This, plus the unusual deluge of rain this weekend, may be the genesis of the small geyser that was bubbling on the floor in the central part of my basement this morning. My youngest son went on the roof to clean out the gutters just in case, and I trenched around two sides of the house to try to relieve some of the water pressure. Fun stuff to do in your church dress and dress boots....Then friend Anne and friend Spot brought towels, an extra mop dry vac, and some fans and we went to work inside. Several hours and no rain later, the geyser has become a trickle and the towels (3 loads of them washed and dried thus far) seem to be soaking it up well.
It looks like I may need some serious basement drainage work done. Like Scarlet O'Hara, I will think about that tomorrow. Or maybe even later as I have chemo tomorrow.
Or, perhaps I could modify my oldest son's engineering school robot project to soak up the water instead:
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3 comments:
Wow, Regina, I feel your pain. Water in the basement is always a difficult thing to deal with.
In the second summer of our first house, we got 23" of water in the basement; the electrical outlets were 24" off the floor, and I had to cross the flooded basement to get to the circuit breakers. On the way, I stubbed my toe on our vacuum cleaner. We needed help from the fire company to get that water out, and we had to install French drains and a sump pump. The previous tenants had never experienced that (there was tile on the the basement floor). Like your situation, there had been a new development up the hill that probably changed the ground water flow.
I hope and pray that all goes well with your chemo today.
Dan
I feel your pain! We had a 12 inch rainfall June 2009 and my basement flooded. Mine was due to a slow, almost clogged main drain pipe out to the street (tree roots) exascerbated by the fact that my gutter run-off went into that same drainage system. I fixed it by disconnecting my gutters and diverting the water to rain barrels and the front/back yards (well away from the house) and re-lining my main drain pipe ($6000). Mine was the only house among my direct neighbors that flooded, so I knew it was an internal problem.
Good luck!
No offense but, LOL. We've spent a good part of the last two winters having French drains installed along 100+ linear feet of foundation, including dredging down 10 feet by the family room, since we're on a hill. I don't wish this on anyone, least of all you!
Olive
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