Chapter 162...Crazy Storm Damage

We had crazy weather last friday.  First the winds came, then the downpours and then hail.  It wouldn't have been so bad if all that rain came in a 24 hour period but we got it all in about 2 hours.  Almost everyone locally had some kind of water damage.


The night of the storm.

The rain was pouring down the valley across from our house and it looks like a muddy river:

Hail that turned into ice chunks.  We had ice chunks on the lawn on Saturday morning...in July:

This storm was fast and furious.  Mike and I turned on the cameras to watch behind the house.  Our curbs turned out to be the best thing we ever could have done for a massive downpour.  Instead of the water going into and over the sides of our house the curbs diverted it around the house and down the side driveway:)

Saturday morning Mike and I drive down the driveway to assess the damage.


Our rocks saved the ditch but a lot of them got swept away and into the culverts:

Our ditch line.  Lots of rocks got moved:

We will have to re stack them in the ditch and up the side of the bank:

Mike standing on the back side of our pond.  Here is one instance where it paid not to mow.  The water flooded, flattened the tall grass and went over our pond wall:

The force of the water was so strong that it moved a few of our boulders on the back of the pond wall:

And the uglies.  The last part of our driveway is still gravel.  From the barn down to the first culvert the road got washed out:

That isn't as bad as this next shot.  It looks like a crater...where did all the dirt and gravel go?:

It even cleared out beneath the road to our underground electric pipe:

Mike figuring out how to attack this problem:

We will have to fill in the hole to stabilize it and then add more gravel on top.  On a good note, if you can call it that, lol, we have a lot of rock that got washed down into an open field.



This field was clear of almost all rock before this storm:

That's a lot of rock:

Mike and I take the tractor into the field and start filling up the bucket with rock:

Mike drives it down to our "crater" and dumps it in:

After about 6 loads it seems like we haven't made a dent so Mike decides to sacrifice one of his favorite boulders:

It's in the ground and protecting the culvert:

We are starting to get it all filled:

Another load going in:

After ten loads of rock dumped into the hole, Mike packs it down with the tractor:

Mike got it all cleaned up and more gravel spread on top of the hole.  We will eventually need more gravel but for now we can drive over it:

On to our next problem.  The water flowed so hard and fast out of the mountains that it went under our driveway and broke a couple of sections:

Time to fix it.  We planned on prying up the pavement and fill it up underneath.  Unfortunately it looks like a job that is too big for Mike and I.



Instead of that we start digging a small ditch along side the driveway where the water overflowed.


Mike starts to dig and adds the extra dirt along our curbs:

Digging some more.  The first section has a spring that we caught and that water is going into a culvert and under our driveway and out to the pond:

The first 25 feet is done.  We will do a little each morning because it is brutally hot outside:

The next morning I work on the next 25 feet:

Looking better:

We have just a little more left:

Today we went down and finished it up.  Mike used the 4-wheeler to pack down the edges.  We may have some finishing work to do but we finished about a 70 foot ditch to catch excess water.  It now runs along the side of the driveway and into a culvert that takes the water to the pond:

You can never know what damage will happen from a storm.  Even when you try to prepare you can just never know what the outcome will be.  Mother Nature should always be taken seriously.


I hope you enjoyed this story and I will write again soon.  We will be working here in the mornings and at the store later in the day when it cools down.

Have a great week.