In this video we respond to a call from a client who’s rental property basement kept flooding. They were most definitely in a pickle.
Table of Contents
- The Flooded Basement
- An Over a Century Old Building
- How Do You Clear Out Water from a Basement Anyway?
- How Was the Water Getting In?
- Watch the Water Cleanup Video
The Flooded Basement
The client needed the water out ASAP. They own a apartment building and the basement was flooding. The residents laundry room is in the basement and that space could not be out of commission for days. Plus, it is generally a bad idea to keep standing water in your building.
So we headed over.
An Over a Century Old Building
This apartment building is over a century old, it was built around 1918. The back area of the basement is really a blast from the past. With its long unused boiler looking contraption in the basement (there is a shot of it in the video) and a decommissioned oil tank. A built in tool table remained providing a bit historical time capsule. With maintenance notes pinned to the wall for managing the old-school heating system decades ago.
How Do You Clear Out Water from a Basement Anyway?
To remove water you need a pump and a hose. When you are dealing with such a large volume of water it is important that the pump and hose that are strong enough.
The pump we use moves 28 Gallons per minute. The hose needs to be strong enough or it won’t be able to handle moving the water and will cause problems, slowing down the process.
You also need a strong electric cord that is long enough to reach where it needs to go. Since the pump has to be plugged in. and there is usually not a plugin where you need it. Plus, electricity and water obviously do not mix. So if the plugins are too near the flooding electricity needs to be turned off.
The electric cord is tricky because you have to keep it far from the water. For this basement it was easy to have to hook electric cord so that it ran along the ceiling, keeping it far away from the water.
How Was the Water Getting In?
The water did not appear to be leaking in an obvious spot. After looking around it seemed as though it was seeping in through cracks in the basement floor and wall. Likely the soil around the building had too much water in it. This was due to all the rain and run off saturating everything. This water in the soil creates pressure on the basement wall and floor. Allowing it to push in.
The long term solution for this water intrusion would be to have the entire basement waterproofed.
Watch the Water Cleanup Video
We ended up going to that property several times in a week. Due to the heavy rain. Once late at night but this video was taken in the day time (not that you can tell the difference when we are in the dark basement).
It is one of our first video editing attempts. We look forward to creating more videos in the future. And for our staffs video creation skills to improve!
