Or, in this case, it rains. I can hear you saying, so what? It rains. Let me remind you, this is the southwest. It is a desert. A day of rain is a big deal. A week or more of torrential downpours? That's a problem.
In 2005, the area in and around the Virgin River in Utah, Arizona, and Nevada experienced major flooding. They called it the 100-year flood. Who would have thought that just five years later there would be more flooding?
Before my parents bought their most recent house in Utah, they purchased a vacation home in the Beaver Dam/Littlefield, Arizona area, where the most exciting thing was a place called "The Dam Bar."
Finally, a place where I could swear with impunity. Everything was "dam."
My parent's home was affectionately called "The Dam House." It was part of a cute little retirement community nestled next to a golf course and near (note the words NEAR) the banks of the Virgin River.
Given that Grandmary and GrumpaMax have a new house, The Dam House was on the market.
Until late December, it didn't have a river/water view.
The video below shows the house at the end of their street, as it takes off for parts unknown -- or as one person says on the video, Lake Mead.
Sadly, this house had been built by hand, by the owner, who had yet to move into it. He lost the house. The garage made it, for a little bit. But he lost that too.
The floods were right before Christmas. Because this was a flood plane, many people may or may not have had flood insurance. Many people weren't there because it was a retirement community and people were off visiting family. There wasn't a flood surge, just a steady rise of water that undercut ground, and washed away ancient cottonwoods, banks, and houses. Fortunately, no one lost their lives, but it was a hard Christmas. Recovery will be hampered by FEMA, insurance, government entities, and inevitable lawsuits.
This is a photo from the next day or so, looking down the street. You can see the garage still standing. The house next to it was marked "uninhabitable" because the back end of is hanging out over the undercut bank. The houses next to that were fine. Another day of rains, and all of those houses would have been uninhabitable too, include our Dam House.
These are a few days later. The garage has been razed. The houses that used to be on the streets behind it are gone. Heck. The STREETS are gone.
Here's the reverse view from another angle in the park. You can see the bulldozer near where the garage was. The houses in the foreground imploded inward, for lack of better words, when the ground underneath them washed away. They didn't float downstream. They sank where they were.
Obviously the road is closed. THERE IS NO ROAD.
So, anyone looking for a nice retirement house in Arizona with partial water views? I know of something on the market.
No comments:
Post a Comment