Again with the Flood!

Six years ago, one month after we moved here, we experienced what the forecasters called a "hundred year flood." We've had a few other wee floods since then, but they never approached the magnitude of the first.

Until Monday.

Tropical Storm Isaias quite literally blew through the Philly area, dumping around six inches of rain in about eight hours. When the rain lightened up, the wind took over and hammered the area with 60 mph gusts. We lost power around lunchtime, but got it back around 3:00. The storm moved on up the coast, leaving a gorgeous, sunny afternoon by way of apology.

I am overly cautious, so I moved my car to the former movie studio/now Amazon delivery van parking lot on Sunday evening. Joe moved his car into my parking space, which is at the opposite end of the garage from the river. I mean, the river hadn't flooded into the garages since 2014, what were the odds that it would do it this time?

Really, really good, as it turns out.

It overtopped the banks and flowed into the riverside lot along about 2:00.

You can see that a few cars are already living dangerously. Maybe it would stop there. Alas, it would not.

Joe kept an eagle eye out, and as soon as the water reached the garage entrance he moved his car. The next two pictures show the view from the elevator lobby window.

By this time (4:36, to be exact), the lot was full, so he parked alongside some other cars on the grass next to it and hiked back home. An hour later, the river had swept up to the top of our lane and into the garage, lobby, and stairwell. The management company turned off all of the elevators.

 

The one remaining car in the riverside lot was completely submerged.

Here's another perspective; these views are from our balcony, the opposite side of the building from the elevator lobby. The water overtook this area later - here's the water's "progress" at 6:00.

Two hours later, the river had taken over.

As the water got deeper throughout the neighborhood, we became concerned that maybe the parking lot where stowed the cars was not immune from the flood, but we decided not to take the chance of wading through the nasty-ass water in an attempt to move them to still higher ground. We had done what we could, that's what insurance is for, let's go to bed.

Well, the water receded back into the river around 3:00 AM - we know this because we are old people who need to pee during the night. When we got up for the day, the roads - especially our little lane, were covered in thick, slippery brown mud. We hiked the half-mile to the parking lot, expecting the worst, only to find the road getting cleaner and drier as we went. We needn't have worried. The flood never reached the lot and all of cars parked there were just fine.

Whew!

Cleanup will take some time, but that's okay; I understand. But I'd be very grateful if they could get the elevators working again!