First of all, I'd like to mention I do not live in an area affected by recent storms. I also do not live in a flood zone. My thoughts certainly are with those who have been devastated by such acts recently.
I rather "caused" this one myself!!
Monday morning I went up to the third floor (we live in a 3 floor condo) to feed my turtles. My largest tank - 75 gallons - only had a few inches of water in it, even though I had just topped it off on Saturday. The floor was absolutely flooded with 30-40 gallons of water! We were gone all day Sunday and I asked DH to go shut off the turtle lights when we got home. Of course he heard the sound of water from the filter because the level was so low. He's just not wired right to realize that was a PROBLEM. So this tank let go sometime on Sunday and water quickly leaked out of it until found on Monday morning.
Well, that much water over that time period sure does a number on things! The carpet, floor, and insulation are ruined and it soaked right through to our bedroom ceiling. We've managed to get a lot of it dry, but we still need to rip up more floor sections and pull out more soaked insulation. Yes, we are aware of mold concerns and are working as quickly as we can.
Here's the problem: we have too much STUFF!!! We know this and I've been asking DH for months now to weed out some of his STUFF up there - mostly his. Our plan this fall was to rip up this carpet and replace some of the floor boards (due to pet accidents), then put down laminate. We did this on the first floor and it was quite easy to do and relatively affordable. With everything that's been going on with my mom and work and such, I just wasn't ready to tackle this project. Now we HAVE to, on a much larger scale, and that's not going over well with me.
This is what the damage looked like before DH ripped up parts of the floor. Right now that tank is moved and most of those floor boards are gone. There are just support beams and then the sheet rock for the ceiling below that. We still need to work our way to the left and also into that crawl space to get more wet insulation. That means everything in the crawl space needs to come out and go somewhere. Bleah.
Once we get the immediate problem addressed - replace floor boards - then we can work on prepping the rest of the room for the laminate. Guess it's now or never, now that we've been forced into it.
I also need to fix the tank - yes, I know how to reseal a tank. Just did two a couple months ago. Then eventually we'll need to paint our bedroom ceiling, but that will be last as it's just cosmetic at this point.
So many people have said we need to file an insurance claim, but I have five reasons why I say NO to this!! 29, 35, and 52 gallon fish tanks on the first floor, and 30 and 55 gallon turtle tanks left on the third floor. An adjuster would take one look at that and we can kiss our insurance goodbye.
So, not having a lot of fun here at the moment, but we'll figure it out somehow. I think the financial hit is lessened by the fact that we were redoing this room anyways, including some of the floor boards. We just need slightly more wood and then of course the insulation. Might need a new can of paint as well.
Huh, and people laughed at my shop vac when I bought it two months ago! It has been a lifesaver...
Flash flood
September 17th, 2008 at 04:36 pm
September 17th, 2008 at 05:24 pm 1221672248
Oh, looks like lots of FUN! You poor thing...
September 17th, 2008 at 05:30 pm 1221672644
September 18th, 2008 at 01:07 pm 1221743247
September 18th, 2008 at 01:18 pm 1221743922
These are pond turtles, so they live in water but they can be dry and on land sometimes as well. I have three turtles all in separate tanks, so this turtle is currently displaced, that's all. He's temporarily in a rubbermaid tub until we can put the room back together. He just lost most of his water and his tank is quite fixable. We'll all be living in disarray for a while! I have updated pics from this morning, so I'll post an update later. Yeah, it's still not pretty.
September 18th, 2008 at 08:19 pm 1221769193