The Flood
I'm post-dating this one, since I've been extremely busy as a result of the insane amount of rain we got over Canada Day (July 1st). My place handled things fairly well, although I did have some water leak into the house as a result of exterior renovations leaving some things exposed. That said, it was nothing like what happened to my parents' place.
At 3pm, I got a call that there was water leaking into my parents' basement. This wouldn't be the first time, as it's an older house. Not thinking much of it, I jumped in my car and headed over to help out. It was only when I got onto the highway that I realized just how bad the situation was. Two off-ramps were completely flooded out, with police blocking them for safety reasons. I ended up having to drive well past my intended exit and then loop around various other flooded roads — complete with cars floating in massive pools of water — just to get to my parents' place.
Obviously, I wasn't much help given the volume of water coming in. Then, the storm drains backed up and what started as maybe 3-4 inches of water quickly increased to several feet of water. It was really jarring to see the house I grew up in savaged by the elements like that. Luckily my brother was already there and rounded up what he could before flipping the breaker to the basement rooms — in hopes of avoiding any electrical problems as the water was quickly rising above outlets and appliances.
Pumps were useless against such an absurd volume of water, so we all just sat around wondering when the rain would stop. The answer was: not any time soon. By the time the ditches in the neighbourhood were overflowing, and water was almost spilling over their driveway, we decided I should try and get home. That was a fraught journey, as I had to take several detours to avoid more flooded-out roads. I was able to get back to my place, but the amount of water in front of my condo parking lot was more-than enough to flood the engine of my car, so I ended up parking on the curb and hoping for the best. My parking spot was utterly submerged anyway, so it was a good thing I didn't risk damaging my car to get into the lot anyway.
It took 24 hours for the water to start draining and the pumps to have any effect. The next 5 days consisted of not getting useful answers from insurance or my folks' HVAC provider. My brother and I ended up ripping out all of the carpets and dragging waterlogged, ruined furniture out of the house. There were quite a few family heirlooms and photos ruined, but it could have been much, much worse. I'll take a flood over a fire any day, although I'd really prefer to not have to make a choice like that.
We got most of the water out, any prevented any mold from growning, but the house is still in bad shape. The removal work isn't done — we're just waiting for professionals to come and strip the basement bare. There's also some extremely heavy, still waterlogged furniture that will need to be taken apart before it can be disposed of. I spent a week working 2 jobs, and I honestly do not know where I got the energy from — I'm just glad I could help my parents out of a bad situation.
A small bit of luck came in the form of rescuing some old photo albums and a significant number of very expensive Magic: The Gathering cards. The latter were all retrieved from binders inside of a bookcase that spent about 18 hours submerged. I do not profess to know the physics involved, but somehow all the really good 'money' cards were in the upper-left quadrant of their respective pages, and were bone dry. I was able to salvage some of the really saturated cards, but they're definitely just for personal use now.
The whole situation is going to take months to resolve, between repairs and cleanup, and replacing lost property. I've had my place flood before, and there have been minor incidents in the basement of my parents' house before, but nothing compared to this. It's incredible, how quickly the forces of nature can scour away a lifetime of memories.
PUBLISHED: 2026-07-01