Flooded basement
 

There were were, Mrs tonrob and I, undergoing final preparations for a long weekend jaunt to Philadelphia, when Mrs tonrob announces that the suitcase I chose a few days ago for the trip isn't big enough and we need the seriously big one.

So there I go, trotting down to the basement, with such momentum that I am unable to halt my progress before splashing into the 500 gallons of murky water that wasn't there last time I looked.

Bugger.

Turns out most of my street had this happen to them after a few days of record-breaking heavy rain.

So off I trotted to a local equipment rental place to rent a little pump thingy that cleared all the standing water in just a couple of hours. But here's the thing - even though the rain had stopped hours ago and now the sun was finally out, the water was still oozing in at an alarming rate.

We have a sump pump, which had clearly failed to do its duty so the rental pump (which has no on/off float switch thingy) is sat in the sump well and I'm there switching it on every time the water gets to the top. Cue a night of sleeping on the sofa with the alarm of my phone waking me every hour, on the hour, so I can go check the basement and pump as needed to avoid a further flood.

The next day I got my arse down to Home Depot sharpish to view the wide array of sump pumps they didn't have in stock on account of every flucker wanting one right now. Amazingly, and despite the helpful advice of the staff that I wouldn't find one for a month, I actually found a suitable unit, almost out of view on a high shelf that I was able to tease off with my fingertips while stood on tiptoes. This was a find, as I'd been told that everything had been shipped off to stores in Rhode Island (which I'm given to understand is almost completely under water in case you're thinking of going there soon) where they had sold 10,000 units over the last few days.

I am not a plumber, but I also didn't fancy my chances of been able to hire one any time soon, so one quick Youtube instructional video later and I managed to install the thing to replace the old one in under an hour. And it bloody worked!

I shudder to think what would have happened if Mrs tonrob hadn't wanted to take all of those extra shoes. We would have returned from a 4-day break during which temperatures had soared into the balmy 70s, warming up the filthy swimming pool that would have been sitting for all that time in our basement.

Our house is on a flat street, not at the bottom of a hill or anywhere near a stream or river. All it took to flood the basement was rain.

The moral of this story is check your sump pump regularly. I can't believe how catastrophic consequences could be over the failure of a $100 pump.

Re: Flooded basement
 

Well done that man! :thumbup:

Re: Flooded basement
 

Thank you. To say that I was chuffed with myself would be an understatement. I am now looking for new things to plumb. My goal is a toilet in every room by the summer.

Re: Flooded basement
 

Fixed it for ya! :D

Re: Flooded basement
 

What a domestic hero. Seriously!

Re: Flooded basement
 

I think that may be the best fix I've seen here on BE! :rofl:

Re: Flooded basement
 

I am not a cat. :frown:

Edit: I did pee out of the window once, but I was very, very drunk and couldn't find the bedroom door.

Re: Flooded basement
 

:rofl::rofl::rofl:

Re: Flooded basement
 

Friend of mine once came home (still living with mother) from the pub very, very drunk. She'd just had new carpets put in, including in the bathroom. He thought he was going to be sick.

Next morning the bathroom carpet was found not very neatly rolled up in the bath. The good news was, he hadn't been sick on it.

Re: Flooded basement
 

A workmate of my dad's was well-known as a piss artist. The two scenarios that stick in my mind were his wife waking in the early hours to a bit of a kerfuffle in the kitchen. Found him stood on the draining board pissing into the kitchen sink.

The other was her embarking upon a spot of hoovering the next day and finding the vacuum cleaner clogged with the puke he'd tried to suck up off the carpet the night before...

Re: Flooded basement
 

I'd hate to be in the Northeast right now and one of the people that have government flood insurance. Before the Easter recess, the republicans (Jim Bunning again) held up the new jobs bill which contained an extension of government flood insurance beyond April 1.

Therefore people with government flood insurance may not have flood insurance.

Re: Flooded basement
 

What a star, my DH FIXED a leaking tap which resulted in 12 hours with no water, as much on the floor as you seem to have had in the basement, and me entering a wet not T shirt but head to foot competition, oh and it still dripped!

I'd buy you a big bag of sprouts for that, and you can NEVER take too many shoe's anywhere, this should serve to teach all men why we need them :rofl:

Re: Flooded basement
 

Re: Flooded basement
 

Our other house that is empty (apart from the stuff in storage in the basement) just had a burst pipe, 600,000 gallons of water filled the basement.
Still trying to get all the stuff out of there, nasty, nasty mold everywhere.

Re: Flooded basement
 

Jesus that's nasty. We had a bit of a mould problem about a year after moving in. Sorting that, plus getting some asbestos insulation off some heating pipes at the same time saw off five grand for our little basement.