Showing posts with label Damage. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Damage. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 9, 2019

Monday Monsoon

I had stayed up late Sunday night (blog, Civilization2 game, a discussion forum).  So I went to bed about 3 am.  As I curled up in bed, it started to rain and I was happy to hear it.  July and August are historically dry to the point where the soil cracks open, so rain is appreciated.  Plus, I'm one of those people who find the sound comforting when I sleep.

So I had only positive thoughts hearing the rain...

Well, sometimes you are just plain wrong!  When I got up about Noon, I looked out the window to see how much rain had fallen.  I have a large rain gauge that tops out at 6" with large 1/4" markers and there is a floating red plastic button so you can see the level.  I couldn't see the red button.

So I got dressed and went outside to check the rain gauge.  The rain gauge was filled and the button was hidden under the top.
So I drained a little water out so you can see the button
I don't know how much MORE than 6" we got here...

I had gone out from the deck and gone back inside the same way.  Then I went into the basement.  Now, I've had wet basement problems, in the past (there is a 12'x10' sunken patio with a 3' high cinder block wall on 2 sides and sliding glass doors, and the patio was poorly built.  It should have been very slightly sloped toward the lawn, but it isn't.

After a couple of hurricanes  that caused rainfall to seep into the basement, I dug a 6" drainage trench downslope.  It worked well, but they fill in eventually and you don't notice such gradual changes.  Normally, in heavy rainfall, I check to make sure the water is draining through the trench.  But I was asleep this time.

Rainwater got in.  I don't mean a foot of water filled the basement, but 1/4" is bad enough.  It gets everywhere.  Have I mentioned that Iza has the bad habit of pooping just outside the litterboxes even when they are utterly clean.  I often just pour a bit of clumping litter on the poops and scoop them up later.  Guess what happens when water collects around kitty-poop covered with clumpable litter?

So I set one litter box in a dry spot and cleaned it every waking hour while the litter-poop dried (and The Mews have been VERY good about using that one).  I used my wet/dry shop vac to collect most of the standing water (avoiding the poop mess until it dries).

So having done what I could in the basement, I went out and looked at the front yard.  I have one storm drain on my property and one shared with a neighbor .  I live at the bottom of a large downsloping neighborhood.  The shared storm drain is almost the end of the line of several drainage easements from the higher lots (just before the last drainage into the swamp across the street).




There is actually a storm drain under this gravel!

It is routinely covered with plant and tree debris and when I can, I pull junk of the grate covering the drain.  But it usually drains well enough.  Any storm drain can be overwhelmed by enough water but what doesn't drain there flows across my front land near the street to the one actually ON my property.  A few hours after even a hurricane the standing water is gone.

Not this time!

Usually, I get small tree debris.  THIS TIME cubic yards of clay and gravel flowed over the storm grate and covered it completely.  The lower 20' of the drainage easement was previously 3' wide and almost 2' deep.  It is filled with gravel now, almost up to lawn level.

I met my neighbor there Monday afternoon.  He had called the County Government about the problem.  I took pictures and will email the County about it (pictures help).  He is new here and was surprised.  He is direct and used to contacting authorities.  His SO (uncertain and he didn't volunteer) has been here about 10 years ( asked if she was the same person who was metalic red hair and black dresses and he smiled and said yes.  I only aksed to make sure it was the same lady I had seen years before.  He's cool.  He admits they tend to stay by themselves...  Well, so do I.

After I went back inside, I decided to check the basement (drying nicely) and went out the sunken patio glass doors.

AACCKKK!

The 3' high cinder block wall around it was broken in half like a potato chip and pushed out 1' in the middle!  I was stunned.  It wasn't like I had much flowing water over the surface.  As best I can tell, it was just that the soil got SO saturated that it expanded and pushed the cinder block wall away.  I'll call my insurance agent tomorrow, but I bet that is considered uncovered "flood damage" even though a tree that fell over from soil saturation would be covered.



See that board in the back?  That was on top of the cinder block wall.  That's how much it moved.

I'm going to try levering the pushed-out cinder block back in place and using construction adhesive to hold it in place.  I'm going to wait a few days to allow the broken edges to dry.  If that doesn't work, I will have a few masonry repair companies come by for cost quotes.  And it may be time to have the patio drainage problem solved permanently.  I had in mind to add perforated 4" pipe just below ground level with a regular pipe draining downslope but a professional might have some better solutions.

It has been a rather unhappy 36 hours.  It could be worse.  In the grand scheme of things, these are minor.  But they sure are ANNOYING!

Tuesday, April 3, 2018

That Surprising Snow

The snowfall we had here the 1st full day of Spring was surprisingly fluffy and sticky.  In fact it never occurred to me that snow wouldn't just fall right down through 1" chicken wire.  But it did.

It collected on the top of my garden enclosure, and snow can be rather heavy.  It bent some of the top frame!
Yes, it is PVC tubing...
But I set metal electrical conduit pipe inside them for strength!
And they bent anyway!   Some people told me I was over-building again, using the metal pipe inside the PVC.  Maybe I should just leave it like that as an "object lesson". 
I tried to straighten one today and the PVC broke out of the attachment.
I'm going to have to think about what to to to fix it.  I really can't just leave it like that.  It looks like a built it shoddily...

Just what I needed; unnecessary work!  Like I don't have enough to do.

Monday, March 5, 2018

Blown Out Fence

I was wrong about my neighbor's fence being blown out in the windstorm of the past 3 days.  An 18-24" diameter tree fell over on it.  No fence panel is going to stand up to THAT. 

But I saw other fence panels blown out all around the neighborhood without trees fallen on them, so my original assessment of my fence construction quality stands. 

Most neighbors went cheap accepting commercial builders fences with 1x4" boards between the posts (and some posts just set in dirt because the owners didn't understand anchoring).  And the upright fence boards are just air-pinned nails.

I used 2x4" horizontal boards and used exterior screws instead of nails.  1x4" horizontal boards are cheaper and air-punched nails are faster. 

But they don't last...  Nails are good for about 5-10 years.  Screws are good for 10-30.  My fence is about 25 years old.  I've had to re-screw a few boards, but not many.  There will come a day when I have to rebuild the fence.  Even ground-contact pressure-treated wood doesn't last forever.  But not yet...

One of my windward side neighbor's huge trees are going to fall down and crush one of my 8' fence sections one of these days.  I can't stop that.  But it won't be a weakness of my fence, LOL!

Looking Up

 While I was outside with The Mews, I laid back and looked up.  I thought the tree branches and the clouds were kind of nice. Nothing import...