Monsoon Sheet Flooding And Why The Dirt Roads Make It Worse

A Pinal County monsoon storm can drop an inch of rain in under half an hour onto ground that has been baking since April. That ground sheds it. Hardpan and caliche take water about as fast as a driveway does, so it runs across the surface instead of soaking in.

On agricultural land and along dirt roads there is nothing to slow it down. It picks up soil, gets into the drainage ditches, overtops them and heads for the lowest point in the area, which is quite often somebody's garage threshold. Most of the storm calls we take describe the same thing: water crossing the yard, under the garage door, across the slab and into the hall. Picacho, Eloy and Stanfield get the worst of it.

That water is not clean. It has been over farm ground and roads, so anything porous it touches gets treated as contaminated. Carpet and pad that took it come out, drywall gets cut back where it wicked, and hard surfaces get disinfected as part of flood cleanup. Drying it in place is the mistake that produces a smell nobody can find in October. On septic properties, a saturated leach field after the same storm sends a backup through the lowest fixture in the house.

The insurance answer is the one that upsets people. Water that rises off the ground and enters at floor level is surface flooding, and a standard homeowners policy excludes it. You need separate flood cover for that. Rain that came through the roof is generally covered, and that half of the job is storm damage. Same storm, same house, different answer, decided entirely by the entry path, which is why we photograph and document how the water got in before anything is moved.

What actually helps before a storm: sandbags or a water-filled barrier across the garage door, which is where the water gets in on most of these jobs, and clearing whatever has silted up the drainage on your property since last season.

After the water is in, speed is the only lever left, and the clock on mold is about two days. (520) 679-8658, any hour.