When Kenny Puff, owner, Westchester Tool Rentals and Party Line Tent Rentals and Green Monster Manufacturing, Elmsford, N.Y., heard that remnants of Hurricane Ida were heading up the East Coast from the Gulf, he paid close attention to the weather reports but didn’t think it would affect his area to a great degree.
“We have five buildings here that house all of our operations. We weren’t forecast to get any crazy amounts of rain by us — possibly 2 to 3 in., maybe at tops 4 in. At 4 in., we can get rain in our parking lot, so we undertook our normal flood preparations, moving everything to higher ground and took care of our customers who usually experience some flooding and are always proactive when a storm is predicted,” he says.
When he left the business at 8 p.m. Sept. 1, the rain was coming down pretty heavy. “Everything was fine when I left. As I was getting out of bed the next morning, I heard on the radio that all these businesses were closing. We ended up receiving 10.5 in. of rain. I have lived here all my life. This is only the third time that I have seen water this high in this area,” Puff says.
Getting to the business that morning was treacherous, with streets flooded and trees down. When he arrived, he saw 2 ft. of water in the parking lot of his triangular building setup.
“I took my shoes and socks off and waded into the equipment rental store. All was OK,” Puff says.
The party building and new design center were fine, too. But when he got to the building that he had just purchased Aug. 5 to use as a warehouse for his HVAC equipment, he saw something he had never
witnessed before: 4.5 ft. of standing water.
“All the heaters became buoyant and were floating. We had originally put them in one room. When I came to check that morning, they were spread out throughout the entire first floor. It was like a marina with all the boats untied. Thank heavens we store them with empty tanks, but everything was submerged. It was a mess. The building had a sump pump, but I guess it couldn’t keep up. Water came in everywhere,” he says.
The water stayed high in the warehouse and parking lot until about 5 p.m. that day. Even so, customers kept coming in. “One of my employees came in with boots. He grabbed a container of trash bags and took them outside. Every employee who followed suit used the trash bags as boots and waded into our rental operation,” he says.
“Before we could put the picks out for customers to walk on, they started coming in, using the trash bags as boots too. Everyone needed pumps, dehumidifiers, dryers and fans. We maxed out the inventory and sold out of our new items. While we still had them, we carried out the pumps to our customers. They really appreciated that,” Puff says.
Eventually the water had receded enough for Puff to go in and inspect the waterlogged 10,000-sq.-ft. building. “It was disgusting. We will have to gut it,” he says. “The funny thing is that as soon as I bought the building, I had plans in my head to make it better and more waterproof. I was planning to work on that over the winter. I never dreamt this would happen.”
Even with his new warehouse destroyed, Puff says he is lucky.
“All of my employees and family are safe. No one got hurt. Everyone fared well. When you put things in perspective, we are golden. You can replace equipment and buildings,” he says.