HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — Some families said they’ve seen an unwelcome consequence after Hurricane Milton: sewage backing up into homes.
“We were just so grateful that we were missed,” said Judy Dolan.
Dolan made it through Hurricane Milton without damage.
Yet soon after the storm, she likened her home in the Belle Glen neighborhood in Hillsborough County to an outhouse.
“One day, we just started hearing [a noise] in the sinks and in the tubs, and we were like what is that? And we walked into one of the bathrooms, and it was full of stuff,” said Dolan.
That stuff, she says, was a backup of sewage.
Dolan worked for ABC Action News for 20 years and contacted us about the issue. She said she hadn’t used her water at all after the storm.
“Within I’m saying at least a half an hour, it started to fill up and started to overflow. I guess the first thing it went into besides the bathrooms was the walk-in closets in the master bedroom, then it went into the bedroom and seeped into the carpet, and then it went down the hallway. It seeped through the wall into the laundry room, and everything was just saturated with this wastewater. It was hazardous, and it smelled horrible,” said Dolan. “I called Hillsborough County, and I said to them hey this is happening, and I think it has to do with your lift station.”
ABC Action News also reached out to Hillsborough County, who told us in the aftermath of Milton on October 10, the County faced widespread power outages that impacted about 700 of their nearly 900 lift stations.
Officials said as of October 14, it was down to 100, but despite these restorations, some areas of the County experienced intermittent power losses that subsequently affected sewer systems.
County leaders said: “In areas with flooded roads and submerged lift stations, stormwater infiltrated the wastewater collection systems, overwhelming the system. This caused manhole overflows and, in some cases, stormwater backups into residents' homes.”
“My fear is that a lot of people don’t realize that this happened to them, and this is covered under your home insurance,” said Dolan. “If it was a lift station, then you can at least get some money.”
County leaders also added it has a claim process, and homeowners that believe they have a claim should save documentation and pursue a claim through the link here.
