[Jelena]

Sorry about all the negative posts but I just have to get this out of my system.
In the sad thread I wrote about plumbing problem. Well, coming back from a wonderful hotelnight with jacuzzi in the room, drinks in the bar we find that the basement of our house is filled (10 cm) with water.
The plumbing problem was huge and all the houses with basement around us have the same problem. Although not as bad as us since our house is sort of placed a bit lower that the rest.
Our basement is furnished like a comfy livingroom and my son´s room is also in the basement. We renovated his room last fall. Now everything is WET!

I don´t really worrie about the costs. We´ve got saving for emergencies and I´m sure the township and their insurance company (as well as ours) will pay for this since it´s their plumbing that broke. Still we´re facing months of renovating and a lot of inconvenience.

Shit happens is a very good phrase in times like this!

[colpet]

So sorry to hear about your flooding. It's incredible what damage a little bit of water can do.

[SCRUGAtes13]

OMG i hope there's no irreplacebles down there, make sure you bleed those insurers dry...

[seebaruk]

That sucks Lena, sounds like you're not having a very good time of it lately I find the best way to deal with annoying shit like this is to make it positive...

Why not take advantage of the situation to create your very own FAMILY ADVENTURE SUPER FUN WACKY WATER PARK, complete with flume down the basement stairs, a rapids section, and of course a wave machine. All the kids will be thinking you've got the coolest house in the neighborhood, and all the parents will be jealous.

[Jelena]

Originally Posted by SCRUGAtes13

OMG i hope there's no irreplacebles down there, make sure you bleed those insurers dry...

Right now there are people removing the water and we´re walking around in wellies, taking pictures of everything. A lot has must be torn out. The flooring, wallpaper, almost all the furniture. Luckily our widescreen TV and DVD was above the waterlevel but a couple of the surround system speakers (yes, my husband likes unnecessary technology) were on the floor and thus ruined.
I hope the sofa we bought my son is OK.
Hrm...better go downstairs.

[Jelena]

Originally Posted by seebaruk

That sucks Lena, sounds like you're not having a very good time of it lately I find the best way to deal with annoying shit like this is to make it positive...

Why not take advantage of the situation to create your very own FAMILY ADVENTURE SUPER FUN WACKY WATER PARK, complete with flume down the basement stairs, a rapids section, and of course a wave machine. All the kids will be thinking you've got the coolest house in the neighborhood, and all the parents will be jealous.

LOL
You´re great! Thanks for the tip. I´ll make a few bucks on this. I´ll let you in free since you came up with the idea.
Actually this is only practical problems. Inconvenient yes. But I tend to be really efficient when there are things to be done!
The positive in this is: Yay, we´ll get a new basement.

[Fairygdmther]

Lena, could you bring in an assessor to look at your basement to see if there is any structural damage to your home as a result of the flooding? - cracks in the foundation, that when it's cold enough, can freeze with the water and expand, causing part of the foundation to crumble. A serious flood like yours can cause long term damage, and it would be to your advantage to have a professional assessor document this.

Lynsie

[Jelena]

Originally Posted by Fairygdmther

Lena, could you bring in an assessor to look at your basement to see if there is any structural damage to your home as a result of the flooding? - cracks in the foundation, that when it's cold enough, can freeze with the water and expand, causing part of the foundation to crumble. A serious flood like yours can cause long term damage, and it would be to your advantage to have a professional assessor document this.

Lynsie

You´re absolutely right. And in our climate that is likely to happend. We´re getting the insurance guys over on thursday to document the damage.
For the moment we´re carrying everything upstairs: Emptying the wardrobes and bookshelves.

[Fairygdmther]

Insurance people are sent to examine, partly to see what they can save for the insurance company. You need someone on your side, that's why I suggested an independent assessor.

Lynsie

[RLacey]

Sorry to hear about this ...

[Sage]

That's a real bummer, Lena.
Over here, there are sump pumps available that are activated by water rising above a certain level in a hole in the basement. Although these aren't exactly cheap they can save you lots of money in the long run, plus you normally get a break on your homeowner's insurance for installing one.
Of course, it probably would have made more sense for me to suggest this a week or two ago, but timing has never been my strong suit.
I hope everything turns out okay.

[Stoofa]

How is the water getting in?

My mother's basement floods every once in awhile because of a HUGE crack in the foundation. She won't get it fixed properly, just patches it, so it continually floods. Now there's mold all over the concrete on the floor and the drywall is rotting. It's really nasty.

But anything is better than what happened to my sister, she used to live in a basement apartment and the sewage system used to back up and get everywhere. She'd then have to spend days washing and bleaching everything, but the smell still lingered. She put up with it for a year (!!) before she moved.

[artwking4]

The basement in my parents' house flooded a couple years ago after a hurricane knocked out the power. So the sump pump couldn't do it's job keeping the extra ground water at bay and the basement flooded about 2-3 inches. Oddly enough there were sections that weren't touched by water (such as where my brother sleeps). I guess our basement isn't as level as I thought. Luckily it wasn't a finished basement or anything, although we did have to throw a few things away. Nothing expensive, but I think our family photo albums were being stored at ground level, too, so they probably didn't make it. Also, my parents were had left for Las Vegas a few days before the hurricane, leaving my grandmother, brother and me to fix the problem. Fun!

[Jazhara7]

We used to have a flooded cellar nearly every year when I was a kid. I always dreamt of taking a paper boat and playing with it in the "pond" that formed around the back of the stairs (the area under the stairs is the lowest in the cellar. I have a feeling nothing in our house is completely straight. I know for a fact that my room's ceiling is higher at some points. Our windows are not completely square either, because ours window holes were actually built, instead of having a premade stone shape inserted during building.). But there was always too much going on with everyone helping to get the water out to allow me any space to do so.

These days our cellar does not flood any longer, though I am not sure why. The last time we had water in there was when our tenant's children for some reason hung the hosepipe that's in our court into one of the holes that are in front of the windows (we have an extremely deep cellar. While most houses' cellars have windows slightly above the level of the street, and your head is basically overground if you are in the cellar, ours has your whole body underground. Our cellar windows are nearly 50 centimetres below ground level, and when seen from the inside, they are at the upper end of the wall.), and turned the water on. They soon forgot about the hosepipe, their attention having been diverted by some other thing that would soon be just as boring. It was some time before we discovered the hosepipe.

Those kids were either terribly stupid, mischievous or just curiously unaware of the destruction that followed them everywhere they went. I am not exaggerating. Another time they managed to set fire to the barn that borders on the house the house. I am glad that our house and that house (& stone-walled barn) are separated by a firewall (the architectural type, not the digital one), because otherwise our house might have burnt down as well (there's about 10 cm of space between the barn and the firewall, if any at all.). You know how they managed to do that, what with the barn being built of stone and them not being able to get inside or into the attic of it (they had not rented the barn.)? They had discovered some large dry wooden planks, and tried to put them on fire for fun (not thinking on what they'd do if they achieved that goal). They did not initially manage that, and eventually they decided to go swimming (it was a very hot summer's day). They had managed to light some splinters, and they left them lying there when they left. Eventually the boards caught fire, and spread up to the roof, which was of course built with wood. The roof burnt down, despite the efforts of at least four fire brigades (including two of the larger cars). Boy, am I glad that those tenants soon moved out (they either paid the rent late, or not at all.).

In any case, having water in your cellar is always bad. In your case more so than in ours, for you actually inhabit yours, while we have an old type cellar that is used mostly for storage of all kinds of things. In fact, the slight fungal and waters stains on our collection of "Asterix the Gaul" comics still tell of the time when our cellar got flooded.


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