Crest season runs March to June — inspections are FREE for 30 days after any crest over the Bend gauge. Duty line, flood season hours: (555) 026-7749.
The Sutcliffe & Roan doctrine
Flood hardening, not mopping
Anybody can shop-vac a basement the morning after. We make the next crest a non-event: move the water before it arrives, seal the paths it already found, and pump what remains with a system that assumes the power quits at the worst hour of the storm. Free post-crest inspections are how thirty years of Bend houses ended up on our calendar.
The crest clause
Any seal, drain or pump system we install is warranted for ten years against water through the part of it we touched — and if a crest beats it inside that window, the re-repair is ours and the inspection of everything else is free. Written against the installation log, not the weather report.
Move it — grade & daylight
The cheapest gallon is the one that never arrives: swales regraded, downspouts extended, window wells drained, and — where the lot allows — a gravity line to daylight. On the Low Meadow this is half of every hardening job and the first quarter of every quote.
Seal it — membrane & injection
Exterior dimple membrane where the dig can reach, urethane injection for the cracks the last crest opened, and seals at the cold joints floodwater pushed through for six hours. Sealing against hydrostatic pressure only works when the pressure itself is managed — so the seal rides with the drain.
Pump it — the 2+1 system
Mains primary, battery secondary on its own float, an alarm that texts two phones, check valves both sides, and a gravity overflow for the storm that outlasts the batteries. Floodplain math is simple: the power quits exactly when the water peaks, and one pump is a bet you lose on schedule.
Posted since 2004
The rate card, flood edition
The same card the van doors carry, reprinted each crest season. The $280 crest inspection is free inside thirty days of a flood and credited to any work the rest of the year.
Crest inspection & map$280 flat
Moisture map, crack gauges, pump cycle test — free post-crest
Interior drain & sealed basin$57 / lin ft
Channel at the footing, 2+1 pumps, alarm, check valves
Exterior membrane & dig$95 / lin ft
Open to footing, dimple board, stone, grade restored
Urethane injection$94 / lin ft
Flood-opened cracks, gasketed flexible seal
Battery secondary & alarm retrofit$1,180 set
Added to an existing basin, its own float and battery
Gravity overflow to daylight$840 run
Where the lot allows — for the storm that beats the pumps
How it goes
The flood calendar
The same sequence on every job — the only variable is your project.
The crest
The free inspection
Thirty days after any crest over the gauge, we read the low houses for nothing: tide lines, crack gauges, the sump cycled and timed. You get the map whether you spend anything or not.
The drying month
The reading settles
Once the meadow dries, the full survey: moisture map against the tide lines, injection marked crack by crack, the dig-or-drain decision drawn against your actual grade.
The works
The hardening
Grade and daylight first, seals second, the 2+1 basin last — in the order water arrives. One crew the whole way through, and plastic to the stairs every night of it.
The trial storm
The exam
The first big rain after install is the test we set ourselves. We ask every household for one photo: the floor, the morning after. Dry is the report we file.
The year after
The anniversary
Pumps tested on battery, alarm fired on purpose, tide lines checked against the map. The Bend gets a full crest cycle before we call a basement hardened.
Tearney Bend, 2025 — 2026
Hardened houses
Six low houses from the last two crests, photographed the morning after the storm that would have had them.
Three crests, three ruined basements, three insurance arguments. Then Sutcliffe & Roan: swale and downspouts in a morning, the drain and the two-pump basin across one week, the gravity line the month after. The fourth crest came in March, the power quit at 2 a.m., and the alarm texted us while the battery pump was already handling it. The floor was dry in socks at seven. That is the entire review.
The works, in figures
They told us the gravity overflow was the line the last crew never pulled — and the March storm proved it: power out for nine hours, battery pump past its duty, and the water left by the front walk instead of through the floor. The photo they asked for hangs in their office now. The floor was dry.
Our wall bowed in the flood and two outfits quoted full replacement. Sutcliffe gauged it, strung it, stapled it — twenty-six staples and a coat of paint, and the re-string a year later read identical. Nobody here works the flood calendar like they do; nobody else even keeps one.
The free inspection after the crest got us; the rate card kept us. Every line item did exactly what the map said it would, the crew rolled the sheeting to the fence nightly, and when the next crest came the alarm sang and the battery pump sang back. I recommend them to every neighbour above the gauge and below it.
Can anything truly waterproof a floodplain basement?
Against the river itself, no — nothing below the gauge line is dry while the water is over it. What hardening does is make the ordinary crest a non-event: managed water, sealed paths, pumped remainder, power-out redundancy. The houses that called us after every rain stay dry through every crest but the once-a-decade one — and that one becomes a mop, not a rebuild.
Interior drain or exterior membrane on the Bend?
The grade decides. High lots with clean access get the exterior dig — stopping water at the wall is the stronger promise. Low lots, shared driveways and mature gardens get the interior drain and the 2+1 basin — pressure relieved, floor managed, nothing outside touched. The survey prices both wherever both are live options.
What happens when the power quits mid-storm?
Exactly what the 2+1 system was built for: the secondary pump is on its own battery and its own float, the alarm texts two phones, and the gravity overflow — where the lot allows — carries what the pumps cannot. The design assumption is that everything electrical fails at the worst hour; the basement does not care.
Is the free inspection really free?
For thirty days after any crest over the gauge, yes — map, gauges and pump cycle, no invoice, no follow-up call unless you ask for one. It started as flood triage in 1998 and stayed because hardened basements start with a reading, and readings blocked behind a fee do not get done in the month that matters.
How do I know if my house is below the gauge line?
The county publishes the crest map and we keep the gauge history in the van — your address answers it in a minute on the phone. Below the line, we will talk honestly about managed water and raised systems instead of selling you a membrane the river will introduce itself to.
The duty line
Flood season runs long hours, the crest list jumps the calendar, and the same crew that reads your house installs the works. If water is arriving today, call before you fill the form — triage beats paperwork. flag@sutclifferoan.example
Free inspections 30 days after every crest · duty line, flood season hours · (555) 026-7749 · flag@sutclifferoan.example
Before the next one
Tell us what the last crest did — the tide line, the crack, the hour the pump quit. Post-crest inspections are free for thirty days, and the reading comes off any work that follows. flag@sutclifferoan.example