Serving Clinton
Groundwater & Basement Water Intrusion in Clinton, IA
Basement seepage, failed sumps, and hydrostatic pressure against the foundation are extracted and dried, and the path from the ground is identified so the loss does not repeat. Groundwater and basement seepage are extracted and dried only after the path from the soil is identified — a wall, a slab, a drain, or a failed sump. Drying the interior without stopping that path returns the same water to the same floor.
Frequently asked questions
It has barely rained here and the river is forecast to rise.
That is normal on a river this size and it is the most useful thing to understand about local flood risk. The stage here reflects rainfall and snowmelt across an enormous upstream watershed, so conditions several states away determine what happens at this bank. The compensation is warning time: forecasts several days ahead are usually reliable, which makes moving property and equipment in advance a realistic option rather than a scramble.
Our storm drain backed up but the river never came over the bank.
That is backwater, and it is a distinct mechanism. When the main river is high, tributaries and storm drains that discharge into it lose their outfall, so local rainfall has nowhere to go and backs up through the system. It can put water into low ground well away from the riverbank while the levee or the bank is doing its job perfectly. The two things are unrelated in appearance and closely related in cause.
Is bluff property safer?
From the river, yes; from everything else, not necessarily. Loess bluffs hold a steep face when dry and lose strength when they are saturated for extended periods, so prolonged wet weather is a slope stability question up there. Signs are gradual: cracks parallel to a slope crest, soil pulling away from foundations, retaining walls bulging. Those are worth watching after a wet season rather than assuming that being above the river means being out of reach.
These questions come from the Clinton page.