13 hours of pumping water from basement

[fireman17]

After spending most of Sunday night pumping basements on the job with the fire department my wife calls at 7 a.m. to tell me when our house lost power our pump seized and now the entire basement is flooded. Had her call the local fire department and I grabbed a pump from my station and headed home. Had five inches of water and extensive damage to boxes of family items in the basement as I was pumping by the broken pump I couldn't figure out why so much water was still in the basement.
Went to the front of the basement by our sewer trap area and found more water coming in from under the foundation had to get a second pump just for there.
It's now 6 a.m. and having a coffee after pumping water for over 13 hours the water is still coming in and pumps are still running.
We have a PODS unit coming this morning to salvage the non damaged boxes and a dumpster for all the damaged stuff. Hopefully we can save some of the damaged items in those boxes.
Going to be a long day today

 

[HeatherC]

So sorry to hear this. What a nightmare! I hope your day gets easier and that sunshine we are promised gets here quickly!!!!

 

[golfgal]

This is a good reminder to people to make sure you have sewer and sump pump coverage on your homeowners insurance. If you do not, NONE of this damage is covered. Also, flood insurance is a good idea but there is a 30 day waiting period for coverage to start, limited coverage as well and if there are flood watches in your area you can't get a policy for 30 days after the threat is gone. Oh and with flood coverage and sewer/sump pump, it doesn't really cover your 'stuff' in the basement so it is a good idea to get that to higher ground if possible.

We have been through the pumping the basement as well. It isn't fun. This house is pretty good but our old house we kept a back up sump pump handy--one with a battery the the event power goes out.

 

[airhead]

I'm so sorry you guys! Hope the rain stops today and you all get some relief from the water!

 

[holycow]

Oh, YIKES!

I hope you can get it under control soon and get some rest!

 

[BernardandMissBianca]

I feel your pain. 2007 we had a trip planned to Disney and about 2 days before we were leaving our basement flooded. I swear my house hates Disney! Every time we plan a trip, something bad happens.

I have a neighbor who is a plumber and he managed to find me the last pump in the tri state area which we ran for days. the odd part is, that we've had flooding since but never from behind the oil tank, which is where it was pouring out this time.


If you have books that you want to salvage, wrap them in butcher paper and freeze them in ziploc bags. You have to freeze them before they get moldy though so time is of the essence. I salvaged about 75% of FIL's books this way. I just left them in the freezer until I could clean them. Scrapping the ice off the pages was easy.

I hope you can rescue your things!

 

[Muushka]

What a nightmare. I hope everything goes smoothly for you from here on.

And thank you for being a fireman. We appreciate it.

 

[kacaju]

((HUGS)) We don't have a sump pump and with this storm I have been sucking up water out of our french drain for 26 hours now just so my basement does not flood

 

[airhead]

Just measured 1 3/4" @ 10:30am. I am bailing with a freekin' bucket and a Tupperware food storage container!!!!! My hot water heater is out but not my furnace....yet.

 

[mtdevine615]

I know what you're going through. After working with the FD and National Guard during the Patriots Day storm up her a few years ago I get a call from DW telling me we now have 2 - 3 feet of water in our basement and to please send a crew over to pump it out. We did the same as you got a dumpster and started throwing things. We've learned nothing get stored down there unless it's in a plastic storage bin. Good luck my brother!

 

[kacaju]

Just measured 1 3/4" @ 10:30am. I am bailing with a freekin' bucket and a Tupperware food storage container!!!!! My hot water heater is out but not my furnace....yet.

do you have a carpet cleaner?? I have used that in the past to clean up the water

 

[Snowysmom]

Sorry to her about your basement. This storm is just ridiculous. DH went down to the basement last night around midnight and found 1 1/2-2 inches of water all over the basement. We have not had water in the basement before and we have been in our house 8 years. We tried the pump we had bought years ago, it died. Went to Lowes at 6 am and then to Home Depot, nothing. Finally at noon we got a pump at a local hardware store after waiting in line with about 100 people. Got back to the house and the water is starting to recede. We had a lot of boxes full of old stuff (DH is a bit of a packrat.) DH is now using the wet vac to get up as much of the rest of the water as he can. Then we start going through the boxes to toss stuff. And it is still raining here in Mass! When will it stop?

 

[mrodgers]

I spent all day yesterday pumping water out of the basement as well.

We have a sump. The bathtub upstairs and the laundry drains into it. Our basement is dry and always has been. We have a stairwell outside with a drain at the bottom that collects water and flows to the sump.

Our pump just went out at a bad time. 2 weeks ago we just moved the old furniture down in the basement and set up a TV area for the kids. Everything else is just junk through the rest of the basement collecting to wait for the annual spring cleanup when the township allows you to bring truckloads and toss in the dumpsters. Lucky for me the area that we put the furniture must have more of a slope because it didn't get wet. On the other side, the front side of the house, the water was 3-4 inches deep. The night before I picked up my guitar and amp that I got for Christmas and put it on an old dresser because we already saw the problem at midnight on Saturday. After about 80 trips with the shopvac full of water up the steps to dump outside, we gave up on trying to empty the sump. A 16 gallon shopvac full of water isn't fun to carry up a flight of outdoor steps in the rain to dump in the already saturated yard.

Obviously there's no where to buy a new pump at midnight, so I new we would get flooded. I just didn't know how much. I moved the carpet in the kid's TV area and a few other things, most important my guitar and amp. Woke up to almost the entire basement floor with 3-4 inches of water.

Ran to the store for a pump. New pump and a shopvac to finish sucking up any leftover water and I went from 4 inches of water to bone dry in the basement in 6 hours. Nothing damaged other than a single sheet of drywall we temporarily put up in the new TV area and an old carpet that was near the computer. Back to doing laundry and taking showers and the new pump is happily pumping the graywater out.

 

[MerMom60_94]

Alas, Fireman17, I am feeling your pain. DH is a fireman and is out pumping everyone else's basements. I am at home dealing with a sump pump that was replaced over the weekend. When I first got home I looked down in the basement and the water was no more than an inch. I just checked again and it is up around 4 inches. So I put on my winter boots (being the girl that I am I don't own any rubber boots so my feet got soaked with ice water) and went down to check it out. Turns out the sump pump had fallen over and I had to get it to stand back up. I am now staying up a little later to make sure the water goes down and stays under control. He is working until 6 a.m. so I will probably be getting up throughout the night to check on things. Ay Carumba!!

 

[fireman17]

As of 10 pm last night the majority of items are out of the basement and in the PODS unit and all the carpet has been pulled up and thrown out so as not to cause a mold problem and also it was beginning to smell. Our garbage guys were great they told us not to worry about what was at the curb and they took everything. Now as for damage it was mostly clothes that our kids have grown out of, toys that were hardly played with so it wasn't as bad as we first thought.
Most of the pictures we found are drying out and seem to be okay the Disney prints have stains on them so we'll see what happens down the road. The plumbing contractor is coming today to start the install of the new pumps and down the road our general contractor will be here to plan work on finishing the basement.
I think by the time our June trip comes around we'll be in good shape and have no worries when we go. One big thing though when we get our belongings back in the basement we'll have new shelving units to keep items off the floor and everything, and I mean everything will be in plastic totes!!

 

[Yankeemouse]

Sorry to hear about this, fireman. You seem to have a great attitude about this, and that's important. Sending more positive thoughts your way! And, first day of spring tomorrow!

 

[snapppyd]

Sorry about what happened! My nephew and his family are still at a hotel - there is 3 1/2 feet of water in his basement that isn't going anywhere. His property borders a river They lost their two washers and dryers, freezer and lots of personal stuff.

 

[fireman17]

Sorry to hear about this, fireman. You seem to have a great attitude about this, and that's important. Sending more positive thoughts your way! And, first day of spring tomorrow!

Thanks, it was tough at first but I know there are a lot of people in worse shape than us. There are items that can be replaced and the other items that was damaged was just "stuff". As I look down the road I know we will have a wonderful play area in the basement for our kids and not have to worry about flooding with two new pumps.