08-22-14, 05:20 PM
(This post was last modified: 08-22-14, 05:27 PM by thebankerstoy.)
ws27 Wrote:Who would have thought to have flood insurance in the desert?
Depending on where you live Rich, it's needed more than you would think. It doesn't rain all that much down in the Phoenix and surrounding communities like it does up in Northern Arizona, but when it does it really causes problems with all of the normally dry washes, as they quickly fill up with water and wash everything in those areas down stream. As I mentioned previously, the long dry spells also turns the dirt into an almost concrete like substance that refuses to absorb the rain water, so once the water gains momentum, it's next to impossible to stop it from flowing wherever it wants to go in the flatter desert areas.
I was talking to my best friend here in Phoenix who has over twenty two years of service with the Phoenix Police Department and he told me a story yesterday while we were talking about the recent storms and floods about how he had a VERY scary incident in his first year of service in a similar rain strom.
He had received a call regarding a motorist that was stranded along side of the road due to having car problems and this motorist was located on a road that at that time had very little business, or housing developments in the area and to add to the problem, the skies were deciding if they wanted to open up with one of our impressive monsoon rain storms or not, so my friend wanted to assist this gentleman as quickly as possible and get him out of that area, because to make things even more interesting, that particular area was also known to flood easily whenever it rained just like it does today.
This particular road travels through several normally dry washes and has up and down dips in elevation which when it's not raining is no problem. As my friend was travelling towards this call in his squad car (one of the old square bodied Chevy Impala's from the 80's) it starts to rain at a fairly good rate, so he starts watching the roadway as he's travelling through those dips in the roadway that I mentioned. All was going well and he was able to see the stranded driver just up past the last dip in the roadway that he had to go through before reaching the motorist when all of a sudden, he looks to his left and sees a wall of water coming down the dry wash that the roadway passed through and that wall of water was only a couple of feet from the side of his squad car!
With absolute NO time to take evasive actions, he braced for impact and the next thing that he knew, his squad car was COMPLETELY submerged in water! He told me that it was as if someone has painted all of the windows black and he couldn't see a thing! Luckily, at the time of the water impact, he had all of the cars electric windows in the fully closed position, so no water entered the car and as he's making decisions about what to do next, he realises that the car is still running, so he gets on the Police radio and tells Police Dispatch what was happening! Since he still had power, he also decided to switch on the cars overhead red & blue warning lights so people could see where he was at!
He's not exactly sure how long the squad car was completely submerged in the water, but he said that it seemed like forever and as the water receded, the cars engine was still running, so he simply drove the car about 20 feet or so that the water had taken him off of the road back onto the roadway and pulled up to the motorist he had gone to help!
Needless to say, the poor motorist who had witnessed all of this happening was absolutely freaked out, as he thought that he had just seen a Phoenix Police officer killed in front of him, so when my buddy got out of the squad car and walked up to him and asked if he was ok, the motorist said are you kidding me? I'm fine, but how in the hell are you? I thought you were a goner!
All in a days work for those who protect and serve their fellow citizens! Please never take them for granted!
Richard
For some unknown reason, nobody seems to take me seriously............
