One day it started to rain , and for the rest of that day , it didn ’ t stop . Instead , the water falling from the sky picked up velocity and filled the streets the way a faucet fills a bathtub . The freeway flooded until the water level reached the overpass . Stalled cars were abandoned after their passengers wriggled out through open windows and swam to the surface . It was nearly midnight before the water level receded enough for me to leave the elevated parking lot where I was stranded for three hours with a front-row seat to what I was sure was the end of the world .
18
I could see the two-foot water line etched into the basement drywall from the open door on the side of the house . I scrambled down the stairs and stood among the ruins . Not only was everything saturated , the water had risen so fast that it picked up objects and scattered them . The furnace short-circuited . The pilot light on the hot water tank extinguished . My cats cried in confusion as they cowered atop plastic storage bins , the photo albums , yearbooks , and other keepsakes inside irreparably damaged . It would take days to dig out and fill the curb with damaged belongings , to rip out carpeting , to sort through what could be salvaged , which was very little .
It was a week before the local stations covered the storm , and only then because of the complaints from neighborhoods about delayed trash pick-up , the overwhelming stench of rot along the streets and the vermin that scavenged them . It would be weeks before the insurance company determined it had no obligation to cover the damage because I didn ’ t have flood insurance . It would be months before the drywall was ripped out and covered with rot-resistant wainscoting , the concrete floor disinfected , sanded , and painted , the mold spores hopefully eradicated . Only then did the president declare the flood a national emergency . The damage , hospitalizations , death tolls , the sewage that filled the streets and basements of Detroit , none of it had made national news until desperate homeowners reached out to FEMA for some kind of reprieve .
“ A flood is worse than a fire . After a flood , you ’ ll worry whenever it rains ,” he said .