I'm watching the news and they're talking about tornados in TX. They interviewed a man who hunkered down in his bathtub with his family and hid under a mattress.

I see this time and time again on the news. Why don't these homes have storm cellars or basements? Nearly every home here in PA has a basement. Mine for example is completely below grade on 3 1/2 of the 4 walls.

If ever we have a tornado warning, we head down to the far corner where the previous owner built a small 3'x6' "storm closet". It's actually a pretty impressive creation. That corner is completely below grade and caddy corner to the only not below grade portion of the basement. It has re-enforced cinder block walls and a metal door. The closet ceiling has double the floor joists above.

It sure beats a bathtub on the first floor.

There's also a company that builds underground shelters that go in the garage. Storm Dorms USA

My daughter is considering moving to Texas next year when she's out of school and thinks she should have one built for her. They also make a room like the storm closet, or it might be the storm closet.

As to why no basements in that part of the country, I don't know. My son lives in Alabama and his house has no basement nor do any that I know of in the area.

Cost is a big reason,soil/groundwater is another.

We had a storm cellar back when I lived up around Wichita Falls.
It was seperate from the house so that if a tornado hit the house you wouldn't be (hopefully) burried by debris.

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Hold my beer and watch this!

In The Wizard of Oz, what did Dorothy's Auntie Em and them go into when the twister was coming? A root cellar or a dedicated storm cellar? I'd always thought that in tornado land every farm, at least, had something similar.

Most of N. Texas is built on clay, unsuitable for basements and barely suitable for homes.

I'm about 30 miles NE of Granbury.

Interesting. But still, why not have at least outside storm cellar? They're rather inexpensive.

I rode out a tornado in an old stone cellar years ago with a client and her brood of six.That was the only time I'd ever heard those kids be quiet :-D
Oh yeah,we lived! The outbuildings and livestock didn't fare as well.

If they dug a basement, they'd have to put the dirt somewhere. If they piled it up, the horizon wouldn't be perfectly flat for 5,000 miles. They have ordinances against that. They like it flat in tornado alley.

I don't know how people can live without a basement once they've had one for a long time. Where do you set your drums up to play without pissi** off the whole family and neighborhood?

GaryS

Thanks for that site. Looks interesting! My son also lives in Alabama and has been through a tornado that took out a few windows...no basement!

A friend of mine from MS lived in a house that had storm cellar when he was a little kid. The time that they had to use it, his mother opened it up and they went down into it only to find it had about 2" of water and snakes in it. Back up they went and hid in the house.

My son lives on the east side of Mobile Bay, so hurricanes are supposed to be a bigger threat. Or so he tells me. The times I've visited there have been thunderstorms, but not threat of tornadoes.

Of course we had a F-0 tornado on my street in MA a couple of weeks ago. I missed it, but my wife was home and said it sounded exactly like a train, just as people say. Fortunately, no one was injured and there was only minor damage.

I've lived in the south my entire life with kinfolks not only in Arkansas, but Mississippi and Tennessee. Although storm cellers are quite common, basements in homes are not.

I designed my home and worked with a contractor to build it to include a basement. Problem was, we could not find anyone in the construction industry in Arkansas who knew anything about building basements. By word of mouth, we finally located a retired contractor originally from Indiana who had lots of experiance with basements. He retired in Arkansas for the warmer winters, when I reached out to him he said he'd help me out. He was a world of knowledge and very helpful and I've never had a single problem with my basement.

Interestingly, mine may be one of the few home basements in the county. It always seems to be an attraction when we have company. It's not that it's all that unique, it's just rare to see one around here. I've had more than one person refer to me as "the guy with the 'fraidy hole in his house." Frankly, it don't bother me one bit.

Rear view of the house with basement entrance off the pool deck. 3/4ths of the basement is poured reinforced concrete with a French drain all the way around. It's about 1100 sq ft but it's not totally rectangular. The basement guy showed us a method to improve stability by bringing the stairway down in the middle of the basement and forming the concrete around it.




You can kind of tell from this view, taken from another hill across the valley, that the house is built on a low hill. We dug into the hill for the basement, built the basement, then fill the dirt back in around it and build the house on top. It was a chore and I can see why not many people around here build them, especially when there is little expertice.

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- Change it back -

A basement with one side open is great but you need hilly land. On level land all 4 walls will be underground and a basement like that could be a damp moldy pit and that wouldn't be something most people want under their house. Larry

Simple reason is that they are not required. Most of the early "storm shelters" were nothing more than root cellars or coal bins. Some parts of the country the water table is so high that you can't put in a basement. Other parts they have to go so deep to meet foundation code on the frost line that you almost always get a basement.
Folks are finally thinking about storms and many of the new homes (especially the ones being rebuilt after a tornado) are being built with a safe room. I have a full basement but I am thinking about doing a multipurpose safe room on the outside of the foundation with access from inside.
Larry

I had one of those storm dorms in my garage in Oklahoma. We had to use it several times per year. It's cozy and nice if you make sure to keep the creepy crawlies out of it throughout the year. Spiders and tornady's... that's what Oklahoma has.

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M&P40c/15-22/SD9VE/Mossy500

My wife and I are considering building a new home. I'm surprised by how many plans don't have basements taken into consideration.

Plenty of houses are built on flat land and have basements totally below grade with simple a cellar hatch door. Proper ventilation and there's no mold issues. Actually finishing off portions of basements is great because the R value of the earth makes for great insulation.

I've worked in quite a few houses where this was the only clue outside that there's a basement:

ImageUploadedByTapatalk1369008307.960075.jpg

Personally I'd hate to have an entire level with no windows.. but I've seen it. I'm more of a 3 walls below grade, the 4th wall halfway with windows kind of guy.


(Sent via iPhone)

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- The Federalist #46 -

I don't know if this is correct but I thought the reason nearly all the houses where I grew up in North Dakota had basements was because having a basement made it more efficient to heat the house in a climate with extreme cold . I had an uncle who built a new home on his farm on a concrete slab and no basement . All his brothers and sisters told him it was a terrible idea. Some of my friends families had dirt basements as did my grandfather's farm house.

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I like Ike.

I have lived in central Illinois all my life, except for Army time, and we have always had a basement. The only house I know of without a basement was my grandma's.

Here's a good ol' fashion basement entrance for ya:

ImageUploadedByTapatalk1369009417.760716.jpg
ImageUploadedByTapatalk1369009449.077546.jpg


(Sent via iPhone)

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- The Federalist #46 -

I believe here in the south it is usually cost. To me it's odd in that most houses down here are built with fireplaces which to me are mostly cosmetic and a waste of money that could be going to a basement. JMO.

Here in central Indiana most houses have basements. At least
the ones i've been in. Some are old root cellars or where the coal
chutes led to the basement furnace. Good places to get to if a
twister is coming.
I suppose in Texas they don't dig that many cause they might
dig too deep and strike that pesky oil field.

Chuck

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They hold no Quarter

The footings that support the foundation need to be below the frost line or the house will move when the ground freezes and again when it thaws.

Trailers don't come with basements.

Seriously, I have a basement, and they are fairly common in my area. It mostly depends on the lay of the land where you build. Some places are a good location for a basement; some aren't.

How about the guys that hire out of state companies to build a "Survival Room"? Put in all your food, ammo etc. Like the "bunker" from the 1950's.

People in the city build a "safe room". When danger is present they get the room, with heavy door and communications. Bunker and Hunker?

But also to have a below freeze for items such as water supply and sewer drain. My house is built on clay and it is effective, insofar as having a basement below where the ground freezes in the winter.

Cost can be another factor - out in Nevada for example, the ground is so hard that even for buried power lines or sprinkler systems they only go down a few inches largely because you need a jackhammer or dynamite to do anything but scratch the surface - so the cost of digging a giant hole is prohibitive.

Tornadoes just blew past here as I read this thread. I am in the basement and they are standard here in Iowa. They originally were for storage of canned goods, etc. and storm refuge. Then furnaces got put in them. Now lots of the newer homes are built with walk-out basements, i.e. on a slope with the backside open to a deck.

Basements are down to a science here with contractors who do nothing but. They can roll onto a site and be done pouring three days later. High water tables are a big problem here so sump pumps are critical.

Putting a house on a slab or cement blocks is cheaper plus the tornado gods don't get as angry if the house rises easily.

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Bob.
SWCA 1821

Mostly because of the unstable soil. This area is mostly clay. We go without rain. Then we get lots. Then it's hot then freezing. The basement walls would move and crack. Then once in a blue moon we would have rain and the basement would fill with water. Storm cellars would not be used very often and they would be full of ants and spiders. Mother and Dad lost their house North of Bonham back in the thirties. Near Turkey Flat. House was gone but the little chicks under a no. 2 wash tub were fine. The tub didn't move.

I'm in the Ozarks and have a full basement. Guy who we bought it from was like Thomas Edison. Built it himself in the fifties. Amazing construction with actual 2x12's for rafters. Limestone bedrock is like 2 feet deep and from there up is rocks with a little dirt mixed in. He used dynamite to blast out the basement. Got to spend quite a bit of time with the guy before we took possession. He was in his late 80's and his hobby was crafting rifle stocks and fore arms with exotic woods. He built a secret room in the house to store his guns in when he and his wife traveled. Got sidetracked but yes I have a basement. Had a pellet and bb target box set up for my kids when they were young.

Most unnerving one I saw came down between my kid's schools.We were driving over to pick up our daughter from kindergarten and it touched down between 2 buildings with our son in one and our daughter in the other.Their mother was a bit upset!

No one else seems to have noticed that tornadoes seem to have a particular affinity for mobile home parks (every tornado story seems to feature video footage of a devastated mobile home, or two, or three, or a dozen), leading me to my theory that there were no tornadoes prior to the invention of mobile homes.

Maybe I'm wrong, but the cause and effect study so far seems to support my theory.

The clay soil answer is right. The soil is so unstable that the basement would never survive or have to be built with so much re-enforcement it would be cost prohibitive. The walls would have to be solid poured concrete with tons of re-bar and then the floor would also be a problem as it would heave and crack.

The roads down here are terrible and not because they don't try. They prep the clay soil with liquid gypsum and pack it down and pour an asphalt bed before pouring concrete over it and yet the road will crack and heave in a matter of months. The frost line is just over a foot or so and because of that they build slab on grade with grade beams primarily. There are basements but they are a rarity. Below ground parking ramps and commercial buildings with lower levels are expensive to build and maintain.

Now, attics, they sure know how to use an attic for storage down here.

Ahh yes, caliche. Truly evil stuff only good for testing nukes and bunker busters. Radio ham buddy told me the story of trying to get a decent earth spike into the ground. It took him weeks of repeatedly soaking the hole, pounding on a steel rod until it stopped, removing the rod, filling the hole with water... you get the idea.

Lots of good answers here as usual. I appreciate the input from the fellows who live in that area of Texas, and we all trust that you're OK.

I worked for a residential contractor for a number of years who built a lot of homes, some with and some without basements. In this area cost is the issue; the average basement adds significantly to the cost of the average home. For some people, perhaps many, it would mean the difference between being able to afford to build/buy or not. If the choice is there, one just has to weigh the risk of doing without compared to the financial impact of having one.

The more recent idea of rebar-reinforced concrete safe rooms in the middle of the structure is the less expensive solution if one is building a new house; and it seems to me to be the better solution overall, if storm protection is all that is desired. As I understand it, these can be built to withstand even EF5 winds. That will keep a family safe. And the problems mentioned earlier of water, mold, vermin, etc. would be avoided.

Something to ponder is that even basements don't guarantee safety. I understand that most injuries and deaths from tornados are from flying debris which is turned into deadly projectiles. I would think that just being in the basement wouldn't necessarily prevent such debris from hitting you. It's also true that tornados produce powerful updrafts, which in the case of the rarer EF4s and EF5s can lift the entire house and suck people right out of the basement. It seems to me that the only solution there is either the outdoor cellar or the safe room having its own footer to anchor it fast. But all this is just my opinion and is, as they say, worth about what you paid for it.

Regards,
Andy

Mobile home park = tornado magnet

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- Change it back -

Storm just past through. Narrow but violent. Lightning hit somewhere quite close. My longhaired Chi is going bananas. He'll be under the covers tonight. Sure ill have some cleanup tomorrow ! But we're all safe.

I would love to have a basement. In fact, I would love to have a (mostly) underground home. The trouble is that when I dig a hole in my backyard, it starts filling with water before it's three feet deep. Add to that the fact that there is very little slope in my neighborhood (for drainage) and you would either have a 5' deep swimming pool in your basement or twin sump pumps running 24/7/365.

The simple fact is, I've been in four tornados in my lifetime, and I've never had an injury or more than minor damage to property.

The garage hidey-holes are a good idea, but my garage is already full.

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Insert short witty words here

We always build all the mobile home parks in flood plains in the Midwest. The land is cheap so the developer goes for it. Most renters don't have a clue....oh well!?

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Bob.
SWCA 1821

That's exactly what happens in the neighborhood I lived in in Northwest Florida. I remember when my neighbor had an in ground pool built. They must have pumped water out of the land area for weeks before they could build the pool itself. The water table is so high that you wouldn't be able to keep water out of your basement---ever.

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S&W Model 15-3

When I saw all the replies to this thread I just knew I was too late for the Trailer Park bashing. But it reminds me of the crime series City Confidential and the late Paul Windfield's comment that went something like "attracted to each other about as fast as a tornado to a trailer park" when making a point. I really loved that show and his sarcasm and the tornado slice was just hilarious.

One thing I have always wondered was the theory behind throwing the old tires on top of the trailer. Is this to help ward of lightning and possibly have some calming effect on tornadoes? It has to be something in the metal. I really don't know. They should study this stuff. I further question whether a double wide is twice as vulnerable than your basic starter unit. I think a special committee should be setup to study this.

I build houses in Okla. and if a tornado is coming a basement is about the last place I want to be. The entire house is usually sitting on 2x12 floor joists or laminated beams spanning long distances and sitting on small columns and 3-1/2" sill plates on top of the footing. If a tornado picks up the house and twists it a few inches its all going to come crashing down on whoever is in the basement.

Texas Tech Univ. has FEMA approved designs for a simple and inexpensive structural wood framed closet or bath room with a steel skin that will handle any tornado.

I recently heard Larry the Cable Guy say "I'm as happy as a tornado in a trailer park!" Basements don't work around here. Most fill up with water, the rest have severe mold problems. Lot's of folks are building safe rooms (re-enforced concrete with steel combination door) with new construction. This solves a lot of problems. They are practically tornado proof and are stronger than gun safes. If I ever build again I'll have one. A neighbor has one big enough to live in. He keeps all of his guns and other valuables in there. It would take a jack hammer, a cutting torch, and a lot of time to get into it. I saw an old bank converted into a residence. I thought that was neat but I'd have to move to town to do that and there aren't many for sale.

The frostline is the biggest reason for basements in the Midwest and places north, having the water and sewerlines below frost line (42-48" in Iowa) requires a crawl space or basement in most cases . Well drained and ventilated basements have little or no mold problems. What Iowegian said is true we tend to put trailer parks(AKA TORNADO MAGNETS) in flood plains as the land is cheap there. I believe the custom of old tires on the roof was to dampen the the flexing of the tin roofs during tempurature changes that or there wasnt room under the trailer to store the used tires.

Several reasons; poor soil is one, or no soil is another. In many parts of the Hill country you have six inches of soil on top of a mile of almost solid rock. You need to blast to get a basement. The fact is, in large parts of Texas you rarely get tornados and in particular if you do get a tornado they are pretty small compared to what you have up in Tornado Alley. Also basements are a good place for mold, damp, bugs and snakes to collect.

There are two kinds of basements:

(1) Those that leak.

(2) Those that are going to leak.

That was my first thought. Why did it take 24 posts for someone to come up with it?

When I was a kid, the basement came first. There was a housing shortage after the war, so maybe you lived in a Quonset hut like we did, or maybe you dug a basement, wrapped the exposed walls in tar paper, roofed it over, and lived in it until there was enough money or building materials to finish the house.

I live in east Texas. The community I live in wasn't developed for many years because the superstition that it was a "tornado alley". Since the town was built during WWII, only one tornado has come close, and the only damage from it was the large hail that accompanied it. I have seen horrific damage caused by them in my area, but I really have no dread of them. I live in a concrete block house, and if I get scared, I'll just get in the central hall, and put my motorcycle helmet on. Usually they leave just a narrow strip of destruction, and don't last very long. After saying all that, I wouldn't live in California, just because the earth moves, and I love the ocean, but no way I'd live on the coast. It's just what you are used to, I guess.

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Wayne
Torn & Frayed

I was a house builder before I became a QC rep for a hospital builder. We built all over the nation.

Wisconsin has clay and sandy soil. Where my house is the clay is heavy and wet. My house has a full basement that has never been wet or even damp, and I don't have a sump pump at all! Proper building technique is the key.

Houses in the north need the footing extended below frost line or the ground will heave in the cold and destroy the foundation.

Basements started off with the thought, if I'm digging out four feet all around anyway, why not take out a bit more and have an area I can throw my stuff under the house for storage? That evolved to putting in gravel for a floor, then concrete, then it was also a great place to put the furnace when central heat came about.

That led to digging just a few more feet and having a 7' ceiling so the area was truly useful. Soon windows were being installed, and sometimes outside entrances.

My basement is made of 8" thick poured concrete walls, with 8 foot high ceilings. My new addition added more basement with a walk out doorway and 36" high windows. The older part has a built in bar and theater room, full bathroom, mechanical room and storage room. The addition has a second mechanical room and rec room. In total my basement is 1,600 square feet.

Basements are actually very inexpensive. You have to dig for footings anyway, digging a bit more yields a lot of extra living space!

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Kirk / Spock 2020

I'm going to go with "they don't know how" answer. I've lived here for the last 39 years. 3 houses. The one highest on the hill had the worst basement complete with leaks. it was a shallow basement. Then about 18 years ago we moved off that hill and down to here. It was also a bad basement. When my wife wanted a new house, I refused to move. So we compromised by tearing down the house and rebuilding on the site. Yes, it wasted a little money, but I got to stay where I was.

So I had my concerns about the builder and his basement abilities. He laughed and said they don't do the basement, they sub it out like most other things. I also paid extra for the 9' ceiling option. That included the basement. The workmanship was impressive. They excavated to what seemed like the center of the earth. It was kind of fun because the 3 lots I own have bedrock at the surface. The trackhoe just dug it out. They went deep and then installed drains on the outside of the footer, and again on the inside. The inside ones went to a sump. It has never turned on except when we dump some water in it to test. Its cool, warm and dry.

And I paid big bucks for a "safe room". AKA food storage room (I'm not Mormon).

Below the top layer of bedrock is a bunch of shale and rocks the size and shape of cigarette packs. All the way down to the bottom of the footers and the drain pipes, probably 11' down. Thick concrete walls, reinforcing rods, and then on the outside a spray on sealant that looks like tar (but isn't) and then some fiber board like stuff 3" thick stuck to it. I guess it also insulates as well as wick any water down to the gravel the drains run in.

An above poster quoted a 3 day time to do the work. That was exactly what it took. I was expecting a 5 or so man crew. What we got was 15 guys plus the concrete pumping crew. They knew what they were doing and didn't waste much time. They also worked beyond 10 hours a day. They knew their business. I've watched other builders who attempt it themselves. Not so impressive.

I also have some experience with clay. I worked for a foundry supply firm in my distant past. Most of our customers were foundries, but we did a thriving business selling bentonite (that's clay). Nice profit margins selling 50# bags of dried clay powder. We called it "pond seal bentonite". Around here a leaky pond can go dry as cracks open in the limestone. The hot ticket is to sell someone a few bags depending on the size of the pond.

Its kind of a radiator stop leak for ponds. It seems to float on the surface, but it also goes down and somehow finds the hole and leak. Then it chokes it as the clay accumulates. All well and good.

Then one day a guy comes in with his big duallie and a large trailer. He wanted 3,000 pounds. We really didn't care how much he dumped in his pond. You put in a bag a day and it will seal off anything. So the customer pays up with cold cash and leaves. The next thing we heard was from his lawyer. Somehow it was our fault he misused the product. It was a dry spell and that's when most ponds leak.

It seems the guy had a new house and he was upset. He had clay all around his house and the dry spell had shrunk the soil to the point where there were inches of clear space between his foundation (yes a basement) and the soil. So he and a friend just poured the gap with the bentonite. Sounded like a plan, but then it rained and he watered it. No one told him it would expand to 8x its dry volume. And so did the clay originally around the house. All the soil was expanding and pushing, but he really didn't expect the basement walls to give. They pushed in just a few inches on all sides. But it was enough to drop the house off hte foundation and crush it. Not possible to even repair! So it made the news and we got sued for a defective product. Except it wasn't used as directed or intended. And you wonder why we all hate lawyers.

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Dick Burg

Where I live, EVERY house has a basement. It's extra space you can use for whatever you want. The furnace, and water heater is down there, and, in my house at least, the water pipes are in the ceiling of one of the rooms, making it easy to make repairs.

There is a gas stove down there, and an elderly refrigerator that works perfectly. I cook down there in the summer, so i don't have to heat up the upstairs kitchen.

I store a LOT of stuff down there, including cases and cases of canned goods, soda pop, and other food. I buy it when it's on sale, and eat it for a year or two.

I simply can't imagine owning a house without a basement.

During tornado warnings, I can go down there and read, or watch TV. It's nice and cool in the summer.