The water was ankle deep and pouring out from the ceiling like a waterfall. A bottle of some sort of hair product was floating around and water was seeping into the carpet of the rest of the studio apartment rather quickly, turning it into the consistency of a swamp. I stupidly ran to get some towels, trying to figure out how to keep the water from spreading further. It did little good, as the towels were soaked in an instant. I ran to grab some buckets to start capturing water in while the ceiling tiles fell down, turned into what felt like soggy cardboard-like things and covering the floor in gritty sand-like stuff and staples. I set up some buckets and a giant trash can and, with another bucket, started dumping as much water as possible down the shower drain. Within minutes I was soaked by the onslaught of water from above. I continued to bail out water, like a sailor in the bottom of a sinking ship, and hoped to God one of the valves [Львица] was shutting off would finally do the trick. Eventually, she just shut of the water to the entire building and the water ceased its waterfall-esque activity.
[Львица] took over trying to salvage #3 bathroom while I went to each unit (23 in all) to tell all 34 tenants that the water was off in the entire building. #5 and #4 already knew; #5 is right next door to #3 and she had water seeping into her room from the leak. #4 heard the noise and came out to investigate and also had water at the edge of one of their doorways, even though their apartment is across the hall. I wish I could have tape recorded everyone's reactions as I went to each room, drenched from the leak with my hair plastered across my head like a wet squirrel and water pooling up around my feet from my saturated jeans. I returned to the basement to find that there was no longer any water standing in the bathroom but that the carpet was turning into a lagoon. After many calls to our landlord and his sister, we got an emergency clean-up crew to come out and vacuum the water out of the carpet and our friend Dan the plumber to come and fix the pipe. It was now around eleven o'clock at night.
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| The ceiling after the leak... photo courtesy of [Львица] |
Apparently, whoever designed the plumbing in this building was on crack. Plumbers show up, look at the rows of pipes and the valves for each stack and open up the walls and just shake their head. There were pipes in #3 that had duct tape around them. Not plumber's tape; DUCT TAPE. Seriously? I mean, c'mon.
We got the water mopped up from the hallway, the girls in #4 expressed their consolation that we have the worst job in the world, and the kind-of drunk flood rescue crew and the kindly plumber arrived to save the day. After much-to-do, the carpet was mostly dry, the pipe was temporarily fixed (it was all caused by two pipes that separated... however the hell that happened) and the very tired building managers could finally go to bed.
Except that it wasn't over yet. Today, when I got back from class (yes, I did go to class despite getting only 6 hours of sleep; I think that's more than some kids usually get, so...), the plumber (a different plumber - Mike, who we'd met over the summer) was here to permanently fix the problem. Except that the problem started traveling upwards. Once the leak stopped in #3, it went up to #103 and started coming out. A hole was made in #103 and water started spurting out, making the carpet wet. Mike had to leave to go to another appointment, but another guy was supposed to come. Except that he didn't, we didn't have the other guy's number and Mike just left with an active leak. It kind of felt like this (minus Sam Neil):
So [Львица] shut off the water again, we waited for Mike and Jim, Mike's boss to return, and I did my Italian homework. The plumbers returned, made a hole in #203's room and finally figured out how to fix the leak. After deciding that the plumbing in our building is just insane.
We were joking about the other day how we feel like all the water in the building was collecting in one area and going to explode. Except that we thought that it would be in our apartment, since we had a leak above the sink (which isn't actually a leak... there's no water coming out of the pipe; it was just strangely damp. Who knows...). And then the explosion in #3... *sigh*.
As of now, all is well (KNOCK ON WOOD). All I can say is this job certainly keeps me on my toes. And Mike Rowe of "Dirty Jobs" fame totally missed out on what would have been the most epic episode of his show ever.
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