To keep his house on Visserseiland in Hoorn dry, Marco Colette has come up with something ingenious. He has built a kind of dam that he places in the living room. With this, he and his wife hope to keep out the extreme high water that has been ravaging Visserseiland for days.
The Visserseiland in Hoorn has been big news in the Netherlands all week. The low-lying houses on it are in danger of being flooded by the extreme high water on the Markermeer. There are huge Big Bags filled with sand to stop the water, but that was not enough for Marco. He decided to place a self-built dam in his living room.
More water on the way
“Luckily we haven’t had any water in yet,” his wife Ingrid tells NH. To keep it that way, her husband builds a dam. “Water did get through between the Big Bags and more water is coming. We do rely on the sand, but more certainty is nice.”
“I drove to the lumber yard this morning for some concrete plywood,” Marco explains how he built the dam. “They sawed some strips from a plate, which I connected together so that it was one long strip. I cemented them to the floor.”
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The water can enter their home at two points. “I have now blocked that. And if water does come in, it will come behind the wall and I can check it well there. Then I immediately take the vacuum cleaner.”
Tension
Marco doesn’t find the situation of the past week scary. “But it is exciting of course. It won’t kill us. You just don’t want that mess with damage to the plaster walls and the kitchen.” That is why Marco and Ingrid have already emptied the entire living room to avoid the worst damage, should water leak in.
The Horinees does have confidence in his creation. “We hope, of course, that it will end without a hitch. Then we will have a nice story for the future.”