Even those who were not directly affected by last year’s floods remember the images of the Warwick Mall besieged by a raging torrent, as well as the flood waters enveloping local streets and homes
The legacy of last year’s major deluge is still being keenly felt by many Rhode Islanders.
Kathy Zachirchuk of Cranston remembers it all too well. Her story is harrowing, but the damage done is more than to just material things.
On that Tuesday in late March, even though the temperature was in the mid-forties, the rain fell as though it were in the tropics. Both Zachirchuk and her elderly mother had been home sick that day when she noticed water seeping into her basement. She started her sump pump and nervously watched the rain fall. But the water in her basement rose swiftly, eventually taking the electricity and heat out, as well as the sump pump.
“I was getting really nervous, especially when I saw the water coming up my lawn,” Zachirchuk recounts. “It was rising around the cars in the driveway.”
She was able to move her car further up the lawn away from the approaching water, but by the time she was able to get to her mother’s car, it was already partially submerged and would not start.
“I called AAA,” Zachirchuk said, “but my street was already too badly flooded and they couldn’t even get close to me.” The car was totaled.
When she went back to check on the basement, she was horrified to find the water coming up the steps. Even if the sump pump had been working, it would not have been able to contend with the over six feet of water in her basement. The water eventually stopped rising at the third step from the first floor.
Zachirchuk and her mother were stuck inside the house for several days while the water receded. While the electricity was restored shortly after it was lost, the heat did not return for days.
The material loss was vast: hundreds of books, stored kitchenware and pottery, a washer and dryer, an oil burner and oil tank, the electrical wiring in the basement, and thousands of dollars worth of clothes that were stored in a recently finished cedar closet.
A FEMA inspector came to survey the loss. “The inspector was amazed by the damage, and said that we qualified for the highest possible claim,” Zachirchuk said.
FEMA later rejected her claim, stating that, because she had flood insurance, she could not "double-dip." They instructed her to finish consulting with her insurance company, and afterwards she could re-file her claim with them to be considered for either a grant or a loan.
Because the type of flood insurance she had was dwelling \insurance, and not content insurance, she was not eligible to receive compensation for much of her belongings.
Her insurance company partially reimbursed her for her central air conditioning unit, oil tank and oil burner, and electrical wiring in the basement. Nothing else was covered, and so she turned back to FEMA.
“FEMA was vague about whether I would get a grant or a loan. It was hours and hours of paperwork. It was very redundant and at the end of it I was so tired and disheartened,” Zachirchuk said.
Not too long after the paperwork was submitted, Zachirchuk’s mother took ill and was forced to go to the hospital. It was at that time that FEMA called Zachirchuk to request a re-inspection of the damage to her house.
“It was bad timing, considering how ill my mother was,” Zachirchuk said. She requested that they reschedule the inspection for another time. FEMA called her back shortly thereafter to reschedule again. Her mother was still slowly convalescing and Zachirchuk was still at the hospital with her. She asked once again to reschedule, and received a message on her cell phone from FEMA saying that they were dropping her claim.
“They left a message saying that they were canceling me because I didn’t meet with them,’” Zachirchuk said. “Even though I had explained to them twice that I would gladly meet with them once things had calmed down with my mother.”
FEMA stated that, if she wished to appeal, she would have to re-do all of the paperwork she had originally submitted. Exhausted emotionally and physically, she did not file the appeal.
“I couldn’t do it,” she said. “I didn’t have it in me to go through it all again. It was just too painful.”
Over a year later, she is still fixing the house. She is using a home equity loan that she had from before the flood to help fix her house, paying for it as she uses it. FEMA did reimburse her for a dehumidifier, but only partially because it was the wrong type of dehumidifier, according to their policy. They also stated that she could be reimbursed for an air purifier to eliminate the mold and mildew growth, but after she bought it, they said that they do not reimburse for air purifiers.
“Reimbursement is not as easy as it sounds,” said Zachirchuk. “There are games and if you’re not careful, you’ll wind up paying for a lot of it yourself.”
“This was a once-in-a-200 year flood,” said Zachirchuk’s friend, George Trudell, who is helping her rebuild. His residence, Riverview Terrace on Fordson Avenue in Cranston, was also flooded out during that time. “There was really nothing we could have done. (Zachirchuk’s) sump pump would have failed even if the power hadn’t gone out. There would have still been the same amount of damage. It was a perfect storm.”
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