trickman
Well-known member
Did anyone else experience the torrential downpours we had this past weekend (particularly Friday)? Rain started last Friday evening and didn't stop until Saturday morning in the Chicagoland area. I heard we got around 7" of rain in one night. This was the night I almost lost my rec-room/basement (where all my arcade games are) to groundwater shooting in from the outside drain and steadily rising up in the pit. My pump couldn't keep up with the amount of water coming in, due to the ground being completely saturated. This has never happened before, and this is the most water I've ever seen fall at one time in my area. The only thing I could do was run a hose from my shop-vac to the sump hole and start draining. I could only do this for 20 seconds at a time, as the vac filled with water quickly, and I had to lift it to dump it into a basin sink to let it flow into the sewer drain. I must've done this between 75 and a hundred times throughout the night. By 7am, it had stopped raining and the water was manageable enough for my pump to take over again. I was exhausted and slept into the afternoon the next day, but it was worth it to save the basement.
I got a little water on the basement carpet, but nothing that fans and a dehumidifier couldn't dry up in a day. I was lucky...REALLY lucky that I was able to keep up with the water, or I would've lost a lot of items, and possibly have water-saturated arcade cabs. Seeing the news the next day of how many people were not so lucky and had to curb their belongings made my insides turn, and thank God that I had enough endurance to keep up with the water.
I got a little water on the basement carpet, but nothing that fans and a dehumidifier couldn't dry up in a day. I was lucky...REALLY lucky that I was able to keep up with the water, or I would've lost a lot of items, and possibly have water-saturated arcade cabs. Seeing the news the next day of how many people were not so lucky and had to curb their belongings made my insides turn, and thank God that I had enough endurance to keep up with the water.

