00:00Leslie Hudson is live in Titusville with more on the recovery and cleanup and I know that is a
00:05problem in Florida and certainly you're a Floridian you know water once it falls sometimes
00:11it doesn't lower very quickly. Yeah that is for sure Bernie but what is so surprising is that
00:21we're approaching two weeks now definitely I've been 10 days and over my shoulder standing water
00:26I'm in probably six inches of water here in this neighborhood in Titusville and what is frightening
00:33is some of the stories that we've been hearing from the folks that had to climb out of their
00:37windows and wade through waist-high water to get out of their homes on October 26th and it's all tied to
00:44the drainage system as you mentioned here it's antiquated in this part of Titusville the storm
00:49water plan was built in the 1960s and really has only been visited a few times over the last 45 or
00:5650 years and it wasn't until this flood event that the city council approved an emergency
01:02decision to upgrade the storm system because again folks in this neighborhood they can't get in or out
01:08easily because not only did they get the flooding here but this particular street is trying to get
01:13repaved so it added insult to injury and again it all started on October 26th let me show you some of
01:19the video that came out of Titusville that night where the National Weather Service and forecasters with
01:24AccuWeather told us that we were going to get significant rains in this area over 19 inches
01:30of rain fell in just six hours in parts of northern Brevard County that was way too much for the storm
01:37drainage systems in many parts of Titusville the cocoa area so they overflowed and the water flowed into
01:44people's homes the problem is a lot of these folks are on fixed incomes or they're retirees and they did
01:50not have most of these people do not have flood insurance because this is not an area that is prone
01:56to say hurricane or tropical flooding so a lot of folks did not carry flood insurance yet their homes
02:02have been completely gutted from all of this rainwater and some folks still can't get into their homes
02:08because again like this street that I'm on it's flooded out so it's really a complicated situation
02:14the city does have pumps that are up around different parts of Titusville where some of the
02:20worst flooding still is in fact there's still a flood warning in parts of Brevard County because
02:25again of this standing water the pumps are running 24-7 to try and lower this water while some residents
02:31say they have appreciated this effort they say it was a little bit too late city officials say this
02:37flooding event exposed weak points in their aging system and they have finally accelerated long overdue fixes
02:44to move the stormwater faster the next time the heavy rains set in in the meantime families still need
02:50immediate help with debris removal sanitation and safe power and water volunteer crews are in this
02:57area trying to help folks to fill the gap but with costs of food up and no flood insurance it is a
03:03really difficult task for these families
03:05we were sitting there watching tv and then all of a sudden the carpet started lifting up
03:13and i looked around and the water was coming through to this door the back door and the front door
03:21and we i got what i could pick up out of it and
03:26there wasn't a whole lot we could do we lost all our furniture we got to stay here we can't just go out and
03:33buy another house we got to stay here till we can figure something out well i was in vietnam and
03:40this thing this really got me i couldn't believe it was so bad
03:45now most of these homeowners will tell you recovery only begins once their homes are safe to reenter
03:53which for several of them just is impossible right now and there really is no realistic timeline
03:59for some of the folks in these neighborhoods of when they can get back into their neighborhoods
04:03remember when you get water intrusion in your home you have to strip the floors
04:07you have to pull drywall out because black mold becomes a huge problem there's just a series
04:12of chain reaction events that these folks have to do they're doing what they can which is clearing
04:16debris before that mold sets in again as i mentioned there are several volunteer organizations
04:22the red cross has been in this area of titusville trying to hand out food and uh evacuate in um
04:28emergency kits for the folks that have been affected but again it's going to be a while before
04:33this area gets cleaned up and there's no really timeline of when this water i'm standing in
04:37is going to get out of here it's got to dump into the indian river which is just over my shoulder but
04:42again it is overflowed the titusville mayor says the city will continue to mitigate the high waters
04:48through these affected areas and they also uh just approved within the last week or so to finally
04:54get an emergency plan to update the storm water system here in titusville which desperately needs it
05:00reporting live from titusville florida i'm leslie hudson back to you
Comments