Da house
I arrived back home to find the power, water, sewer, and internet fully working. The internet completely surprised me, and I was thankful for it. The house itself weathered the storm with flying colors. No water inside at all, and only a tiny bit of damage to the front where some piece of debris pierced a wood slat. I did lose one of my storm shutters as well. As for the trees, I completely lost my schlefera (it's a pity because I liked that one and it hid an ugly window A/C unit). My avocado tree looks pretty toast as well. The pine tree right next to the house looks perfectly fine, and is still green even. I lost all my hibiscus bushes, as well as most of the ferns. I think some of the cacti are still alive, as are a few day lillies. My sehpora is still green, but it has been split apart and is lying on the ground in 2 different directions. Everything in the back of the house looks fine tree/bush wise.
My storage shed out back got flooded. It's got just the tiniest layer of dried filth on the bottom. It rusted out my bike chain pretty badly (I can still ride it, just barely, and the brakes are far less than fabulous). It totaled my lawn mower, as well as a rolling plastic storage container and it's contents. It got the bottom 2 shelves of a metal storage rack as well as two wood chairs. I'm hoping that all is covered by flood insurance, but I'm not sure since it's a detached building and I don't quite understand the wording on my policy for that since it isn't an actual garge.
The main causility is my gigantic air conditioning/heating unit. It was almost fully submerged. I also lost the duct work that supplies to hot/cold air to the house. It lives under the house, and you can see the water line on most of it, and several leads are no longer connected to the house. I've got someone from Home Depot coming to give me an estimate on a completely new system on Monday, as well as the flood insurance adjuster coming out then as well.
There is also no gas (natural, not the car variety) on most of the island. Just about everyone's gas meters got submerged, so the city went around and turned all of them completely off. We are allowed to pay a plumber $150 to inspect the meter, and then file a permit with the city to get it turned back on at a later date. I've also heard that all of our meters need to be replaced since they were submerged. The plumber that everyone on my block uses died 3 days before the storm, so none of us have any idea who to call or really what to do about the situation at all. My gas lines thankfully didn't get submerged, so once the meter gets turned on, things should be good to go. I've learned that taking cold showers aren't a lot of fun. My heater and my water heater are the only things in the house that run on gas. I can do without the heater right now, but hot water sure would be nice. I did manage to find my solar shower late this afternoon, so I'm hoping tomorrow's shower will be a bit warmer, although with far less water pressure. I'm wondering which one I'm going to prefer.
The one very comical thing is that I now have a giant trash dumpster residing in my backyard. It apparently came from O'Connell High School which is 3 blocks from here. No one is quite sure how it got back there, but it's between a tree, a brick fence, and my patio. It would have just barely fit between my house and another neighbors fence, but there are no marks on either my house, the fence, or the A/C unit which it certainly would have hit. The other option is that a tornado carried it, but there is no damage to any structures around it (my house, the porch, a neighbors garage apartment, or any fence along my backyard) so I'm guessing it will remain a mystery. The waste management people laughed on the phone when I told them about it. The guy that came out to look at it did as well. It's kinda become the neighborhood joke, and I've had all my neighbors back to take pictures. The guy that came out said that they would most likely have to cut it out as there is no way a truck can get to my backyard - the side of my house is too narrow for my car, and the alley entrance is blocked by my storage shed. I have no idea when they will be coming to blow torch it out. It does contain about 1/4 of it's size worth of trash. Thankfully, that hasn't started to stink yet.
All in all, I feel pretty dang lucky. There are large portions of Galveston that got hit really hard by the flood waters - not from the Gulf, but from the bay hours before the storm actually came ashore. I biked to a friends house to see if he had power, and saw many people throwing the entire contents of their downstairs living space out onto the street - carpets, sofas, mattress, as well as all their appliances. It seems I was in a nice sweet spot that escaped fairly unharmed. The only stuff that took a hit around my neighborhood was stuff people had in their garages at street level. Most of the houses around here are raised somewhat - usually 3-9 feet depending on the house. That saved us as the water line is about 6 inches below getting in my house.
My storage shed out back got flooded. It's got just the tiniest layer of dried filth on the bottom. It rusted out my bike chain pretty badly (I can still ride it, just barely, and the brakes are far less than fabulous). It totaled my lawn mower, as well as a rolling plastic storage container and it's contents. It got the bottom 2 shelves of a metal storage rack as well as two wood chairs. I'm hoping that all is covered by flood insurance, but I'm not sure since it's a detached building and I don't quite understand the wording on my policy for that since it isn't an actual garge.
The main causility is my gigantic air conditioning/heating unit. It was almost fully submerged. I also lost the duct work that supplies to hot/cold air to the house. It lives under the house, and you can see the water line on most of it, and several leads are no longer connected to the house. I've got someone from Home Depot coming to give me an estimate on a completely new system on Monday, as well as the flood insurance adjuster coming out then as well.
There is also no gas (natural, not the car variety) on most of the island. Just about everyone's gas meters got submerged, so the city went around and turned all of them completely off. We are allowed to pay a plumber $150 to inspect the meter, and then file a permit with the city to get it turned back on at a later date. I've also heard that all of our meters need to be replaced since they were submerged. The plumber that everyone on my block uses died 3 days before the storm, so none of us have any idea who to call or really what to do about the situation at all. My gas lines thankfully didn't get submerged, so once the meter gets turned on, things should be good to go. I've learned that taking cold showers aren't a lot of fun. My heater and my water heater are the only things in the house that run on gas. I can do without the heater right now, but hot water sure would be nice. I did manage to find my solar shower late this afternoon, so I'm hoping tomorrow's shower will be a bit warmer, although with far less water pressure. I'm wondering which one I'm going to prefer.
The one very comical thing is that I now have a giant trash dumpster residing in my backyard. It apparently came from O'Connell High School which is 3 blocks from here. No one is quite sure how it got back there, but it's between a tree, a brick fence, and my patio. It would have just barely fit between my house and another neighbors fence, but there are no marks on either my house, the fence, or the A/C unit which it certainly would have hit. The other option is that a tornado carried it, but there is no damage to any structures around it (my house, the porch, a neighbors garage apartment, or any fence along my backyard) so I'm guessing it will remain a mystery. The waste management people laughed on the phone when I told them about it. The guy that came out to look at it did as well. It's kinda become the neighborhood joke, and I've had all my neighbors back to take pictures. The guy that came out said that they would most likely have to cut it out as there is no way a truck can get to my backyard - the side of my house is too narrow for my car, and the alley entrance is blocked by my storage shed. I have no idea when they will be coming to blow torch it out. It does contain about 1/4 of it's size worth of trash. Thankfully, that hasn't started to stink yet.
All in all, I feel pretty dang lucky. There are large portions of Galveston that got hit really hard by the flood waters - not from the Gulf, but from the bay hours before the storm actually came ashore. I biked to a friends house to see if he had power, and saw many people throwing the entire contents of their downstairs living space out onto the street - carpets, sofas, mattress, as well as all their appliances. It seems I was in a nice sweet spot that escaped fairly unharmed. The only stuff that took a hit around my neighborhood was stuff people had in their garages at street level. Most of the houses around here are raised somewhat - usually 3-9 feet depending on the house. That saved us as the water line is about 6 inches below getting in my house.