Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
NPR had a segment this afternoon about how there are very few homes in the Moore area with basements because of the clay soil and high water table. In the past clay soil, which absorbs a lot of water, often led to leaky basements. I know growing up in the Washington, D.C. area, this was always a concern.
According to one contractor they interviewed, there are improved methods for waterproofing basements now, but too many people associate basements in areas with clay soil with the problems of 50s and 60 houses.
Living in North Alabama feels like living in a tornado zone these days. Our current home does not have a basement or shelter. We will begin building a new house in July. There will be a tornado shelter in the garage. We have already ordered and paid for it. A shelter was the first "have to have" on our list.
^^^I have a friend that lives in AL. Her home doesnt have a basement and neither do any of the homes in her development. Sometimes its just too expensive due to how the ground is. My friend's home has been damaged by two tornados in the last two years. She is having a shelter built under her garage as well.
Well, I've lived in Texas almost all my life and I have seen ONE home in all my years that had a basement. Texas is known as "Tornado Capitol" so I don't get it. I found an interesting online hub about it though, as it pertains to Texas anyway:
Interestingly enough, my early years were full of tornadoes.. I apparently slept through more than one that came very near our house, but that was in Kansas and Arkansas, where I lived from ages 1 to 3, and not Texas. I don't recall any real fear of tornadoes in all my years in Texas but I guess I've lived in parts of it where it was less likely. My mother lives out in the country, in a triple wide, and I do worry about her every time there's a tornado warning.
People keep going on and on about basements in Oklahoma. Every home I know of that is out in the country has a cellar. And I mean EVERY place. I think in the old days, that was the "norm". I only know of a few homes in the city that have cellars. A lot of small towns have homes with cellars. But that is just my experience.
I think it would be like an okie telling people in Joisey what they should have or should not have.
Personally, I would not want a basement. Why? Because it could be worse because if your home takes a direct hit, you would have your entire house on top of you. And who knows if a basement would hold the weight of the house on top of it. You could be crushed.
One of my fondest childhood memories in southwestern Oklahoma was the frequent trips to the cellar during storms. That was looong before dopplar radar and newsmen going bonkers. We lived way out in the country too. I loved those trips to the cellar with my grandparents.
Of course, my Grandparents had a barn that was picked up and dropped a 1/4 mile away. I also think a lot of country folks have a healthy respect for mother nature. Just sayin...
For you city folks a cellar is that thing Dorothy got locked out of in the Wizard of the Oz.
I find this interesting to be so down on people in tornado zones not having a shelter. Isn't it equivalent to people living in earthquake zones, on a cliff, near a forest that burns, where there are hurricanes........ We lived in NC and AL and didn't like the hurricanes so we moved to stay out of harm's way. When I was a child, we drove through after the Palm Sunday tornadoes went through northern IN and you really need to do this to grasp what it is like, what it does. That was years and years ago. We have lived in a few cities in KS and not had a basement or shelter because seriously, the expense and availability of such and the actual chance that a tornado will hit just don't compute. Our current house has been in this location for at least 75 years and a tornado passed closely last week and we were in the basement, another one of our homes had been in place for over 100 years and the other over 50 years - all had cellars/basements but rarely needed even for a warning. I usually stand outside to watch the clouds. It just amounts to playing the odds considering the likelihood of something happening to the cost of maybe, just maybe, it being safer a time or two or not. We do this with more than weather events. I cannot see being critical of these people. ***When buying a house, we did not consider the basement as a critical item.
I do live in an area that gets tornados and have no basement. If I did have a basement it would probably be a good swimming pool. We have one person with a basement in our area that I know about and I have been told it has about a foot of water in it. We all do the best we can.
Well, I've lived in Texas almost all my life and I have seen ONE home in all my years that had a basement. Texas is known as "Tornado Capitol" so I don't get it. I found an interesting online hub about it though, as it pertains to Texas anyway:
Interestingly enough, my early years were full of tornadoes.. I apparently slept through more than one that came very near our house, but that was in Kansas and Arkansas, where I lived from ages 1 to 3, and not Texas. I don't recall any real fear of tornadoes in all my years in Texas but I guess I've lived in parts of it where it was less likely. My mother lives out in the country, in a triple wide, and I do worry about her every time there's a tornado warning.
You remind me that, growing up in Fort Worth we lived on a street in which houses on the west side had basements (or, at least, some) while none of those on the east side of the street had basements. A medical doctor purchased a lot on the east side, and declared his intention to build a basement, complete with an elevator.
Neighbors, including my father, told the doctor it was a bad idea: that running underneath the east side of the street was some type of 'underground river'. The doctor pushed ahead with his idea.
Sure enough, when the house was finished, the elevator shaft was flooded, and remained flooded thereafter. We children found the flooded shaft endlessly fascinating (I'm surprised, on reflection, that none of us drowned). The basement itself was also 'wet' at times. It was a strong lesson to me to listen to the locals.
My great-grandmother's house in morthwest Kansas had a tornado shelter, just like the one in the Wizard of Oz. We used it once that I recall, although I never saw a tornado (indeed, age 57 and I have still never laid eyeballs on a tornado, although I did once see a funnel cloud).
We have a weekend mobile home in East Texas, and I am starting to think of having some type of storm shelter built. I think I will wait until winter (one such website I checked yesterday took down its prices; I imagine that, in light of recent events and current high demand, they wanted to be able to charge more).
As long as the water table wasn't too high. IMO, it's a critical part any home for many reasons. But in certain areas, it's asking for trouble unless you like dirty, moldy, toxic, covered swimming pools.
I lived for 12 years in Nebraska, which is also in tornado alley, and my house had no basement- it was just on a slab. I guess we didn't think much of it, because tornado risk is vastly different from risks in other areas, such as hurricane risk. When a hurricane is coming your entire region is most definitely going to get hit and have damage. With tornadoes, the risk is so minuscule that you'd actually get hit by one. Nebraska would average about 50 or 55 tornadoes per year, if I am remembering correctly. An average tornado is a few hundred yards wide and travels maybe a mile or less. So you put those tornado touchdowns and paths onto the map of a big state like Nebraska and you see that they are barely specks on that big map. The risk of drowning in your toilet is probably higher even in tornado alley than actually being hit by a tornado.
So basically it's just a matter of weighing the cost vs. need, if you are building a house is it worth the extra $20,000 to build a basement if your only need is tornado protection when the odds of actually being hit by one are probably about what they are to win the Powerball jackpot? Most people say no- they will build basements if they need the space or want them for other reasons, but never just out of fear of tornadoes.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Thank you
Every home I know of that is out in the country has a cellar. And I mean EVERY place. I think in the old days, that was the "norm". I only know of a few homes in the city that have cellars. A lot of small towns have homes with cellars. But that is just my experience. 
