Flood protection

[pugmom]

For any ERs in Florida (or Texas or ?), I see that many people use sand bags
when water might rise (say) less than 10 inches or so, but I was wondering
whether anyone had explored other flood barriers. I have seen a few that
could protect up to a few feet... these require attaching a frame to the doors.
But I was wondering why there does not exist a storm door that works like
a hatch in a submarine. Is that too crazy?
I realize that a 10 foot storm surge will overcome all of these, but I was just
wondering if anyone went beyond sand bags.

 

[Texas Proud]

Not sure about your construction but water can come through the weep holes in our brick walls... just blocking the doors will not protect you...

So, you need a barrier all around your property.... and the one time I saw someone who had that eventually flooded... it was interesting to see the property like an island in the flood... but the water eventually percolated up under the wall and flooded the place...

 

[pugmom]

Not sure about your construction but water can come through the weep holes in our brick walls... just blocking the doors will not protect you...

So, you need a barrier all around your property.... and the one time I saw someone who had that eventually flooded... it was interesting to see the property like an island in the flood... but the water eventually percolated up under the wall and flooded the place...

I kind of figured that... one hates to be fatalistic, but sometimes that is actually realistic!

 

[Sunset]

I did see once a clever idea a person did of surrounding the home in plastic up about 4 or 5 feet and anchoring it on the outside edge with sandbags. It worked, but I don't know for how long.
Folks that simply sandbagged around their house were flooded as sandbags alone are not waterproof.

This person did it and it worked until the flood went over 1 foot. Flood ended at 4.5 feet.
Texas flooding

 

[Dtail]

Just sandbags for us. The water only came up to one back door with Hurricane Irma.

 

[pugmom]

Just sandbags for us. The water only came up to one back door with Hurricane Irma.

We live in St Pete Beach... 1/10 mile from the Gulf, and so far we have never had water approach our front door. Fingers crossed!

 

[Masquernom]

If I read the article correctly, the flood water was 5 feet deep. Hard to keep that out of anywhere.
They make a sort of threshold for doors that will pop up by themselves if they get too much liquid. In the chemical industry they're used to prevent spills from spreading through an opening. But they wouldn't help for something like this. I guess if you had a waterproof wall around your property you could install one across the driveway opening to automatically protect in case of excessive rain. But it would be popping up a lot.

 

[Badger]

We live a couple of short blocks to the ocean in NE Fl so the water table runs about 3 feet below the surface. I have lived in Florida since 1962 and have seen quite a few hurricanes and nor'easters during that time. Our 73 year old house is built on a slab with ducts in the slab and there have been a few times that they filled with water within an inch or two to the floor. Sandbags won't help us. On one occasion when a large hurricane was coming we decided it was a good time to "bug out". My wife suggested that we put furniture on concrete blocks in case of flooding. I just laughed. If the water level was high enough to come through the doors then the house would already be flooded with water coming up through the floor.

 

[Mark1]

I lived in subdivision in the Houston area for many years and did think once, if the street flooding got so bad would it make sense to place a board across the front door entry area to knock down the wake from big trucks driving down the street. It never got any where near an issue for us, but on the news I always noticed the big trucks driving down the street generating huge wake.

 

[Koolau]

We have friends who moved to Houston. Their house flooded completely so they rebuilt. The new house flooded completely a second time. They gave up and moved "back home." Some places just flood.

 

[W2R]

We deliberately chose houses in a part of New Orleans which is less likely to flood than others. Neither house has ever flooded in the 60+ years since they were built (we know this for sure, since Frank and/or members of his family have lived in his house continually since the day it was built in the early 1960's - - and my house is next door). The street DOES flood, but the lots are graded and our houses are considerably above street level.

That said, this is New Orleans and we aren't stupid, so we both carry flood insurance.

Some people elevate their homes and live on what would otherwise be considered the second floor. The ground level floor is not enclosed, so they use it for parking, for a place to put their outdoor barbecue, and so on. That's what Frank's family did with the family fishing camp down south of New Orleans on the Gulf of Mexico (see photo below).

 

[aja8888]

We have friends who moved to Houston. Their house flooded completely so they rebuilt. The new house flooded completely a second time. They gave up and moved "back home." Some places just flood.

Some people just have no common sense. Lots of areas around Houston have never flooded and won't in the future. This is not rocket science.

 

[Texas Proud]

We have friends who moved to Houston. Their house flooded completely so they rebuilt. The new house flooded completely a second time. They gave up and moved "back home." Some places just flood.

To be fair, the places that flood are pretty well know most of the time (Harvey was different) and if you stay away from those areas you are good...

Just a guess from me but I bet 90% to 95% of Houston does not flood when you see pictures of Houston flooding on the news.. I am talking about getting in the houses... street flooding is designed to happen so that is not a big deal...

 

[folivier]

W2R Grand Isle or Fourchon?
Nice camp.

 

[Koolau]

Some people just have no common sense. Lots of areas around Houston have never flooded and won't in the future. This is not rocket science.

The sad part is that they moved to Houston because he didn't want to retire from his Megacorp which had an opening in Houston when his j*b back home got eliminated. They had no idea what they were getting into as far as flood zones. I guess they bought into the 100 year flood theory.

Now, the REST of the sad story. Following their 2 floods, he got terminal cancer and passed at 62.