Late Summer Storms and Sewer Backups

Don’t Let a Late Summer Storm Send Your Sewer Line Backward

August in the Roanoke Valley has a nice rhythm to it. Hot, sticky afternoon, clouds stacking up over the mountains, then an hour of rain that comes down hard enough to make you pull over on Route 419. By dinnertime the sun’s back out and the driveway is already dry. But your sewer line has had a very different experience.

Storm season backups are one of the calls Southern Trust Home Services fields most often in late summer, and the frustrating part for homeowners is how sudden it feels. Nothing was wrong on Tuesday. Now suddenly onWednesday there’s water standing in your basement floor drain. After 30 years of service across the Roanoke area, our seasoned team can tell you exactly what the problem is, and that it almost always starts well before a storm arrives. Keep reading to discover our guide on late summer storms and sewer backups. 

Why Do Sewer Backups Happen After Heavy Rain?

Heavy rain changes what your sewer line is being asked to handle, and it changes the ground the pipe sits in as well. A line that was managing fine at normal volume can lose that margin in a single afternoon.

A few things tend to stack up at once:

• Does rainwater actually get into the sewer line? It certainly can. Older clay and cast iron lines develop cracks and loose joints over time, and groundwater pushes in through every single one of them. That’s called infiltration, and it means your line is carrying the storm runoff on top of everything else your household already sends down it.
• Why do tree roots matter more in August? Tree roots chase moisture, and by late summer they’ve spent months growing toward the steady dampness around a leaky sewer joint. A root mass that was barely a snag in June can be a real blockage by the time the heavy rain shows up in August.
• Can the ground itself shift the pipe? Yes. Roanoke County soil goes through dry stretches and then soaks, and that swelling and settling can pull a joint apart or throw a section of pipe out of the slope it needs to drain properly. Once the slope is gone, waste sits still and debris collects.
• What about the city main during a storm? When your whole neighborhood’s runoff arrives all at the same time, the main line can certainly get full. If your home doesn’t have a working backwater valve, a full water main only has one place left to go, and that’s the lowest drain in your house.

What Are the Warning Signs Before a Backup Happens?

Sewer lines rarely fail without warning. They just tend to warn quietly, and most of it is easy to miss when you’re busy. Here’s what to watch for through storm season.

1. Gurgling Toilets or Drains: Once air gets trapped behind a partial blockage, it will start to create noise. If flushing an upstairs toilet makes the downstairs tub gurgle, those fixtures are sharing a problem downstream.
2. More Than One Slow Drain: A single slow sink is usually just a simple, local clog – no big deal. But two or three slow fixtures on different sides of the house point to a problem with the main line that shouldn’t be ignored.
3. Odors You Can’t Track Down: A sewer smell in a basement, crawlspace, or near a floor drain often means a crack or a dry trap letting gas escape where it shouldn’t.
4. A Stripe of Extra Green Grass: If one patch of your yard is taller and greener than everything around it, something is feeding it. Leaking sewage is a very effective fertilizer, unfortunately.
5. Soggy Ground or Puddles that Linger: Standing water in the yard days after the rain stopped, especially in a line running from the house toward the street, is worth a look.
6. Water Backup When Running the Washer: Big volume all at once is a stress test. If the floor drain reacts every time the washing machine drains, your main line is already near its limit.

How Does Southern Trust Diagnose and Fix a Storm Season Sewer Problem?

Guessing at a sewer line gets expensive fast, but you can count on our licensed technicians to get the job done right and as efficiently as possible. Every Southern Trust technician is background checked, certified, and insured, and you’ll get a heads up before we arrive rather than a four hour window and a shrug.

1. Camera Inspection: First and foremost, we need to get an idea of what exactly is going in your sewer line. We’ll begin by sending a sewer camera down the line and watching the feed on screen with you. This is how you find out whether you’re dealing with roots, a crack,  sag, or wipe that never should have gone down the toilet in the first place. The best part is there’s no trenching required to get an answer.
2. Drain Clearing & Rooter Service: For a blockage that’s already causing trouble, drain clearing and rooter services cut through the obstruction to get your fixtures draining smoothly again. The best part is this can often be completed in one single visit, and will prevent a backup from manifesting into a fully flooded basement. 
3. Hydro Jetting: Hydro jetting scours the inside of your line with high pressure water that clears out grease, scale, and root hair so the pipe drains at full capacity instead of most of it.
4. Sewer Line Repair or Replacement: If the initial camera inspection shows a broken or separated section of your sewer line, the right solution is to repair or replace it. Our trenchless sewer line repair option can restore your main line with far less digging, which actually matters when the pipe runs under a driveway or a lawn you’ve spent years working on.
5. Sump Pump Services: If your basement relies on a sump pump like many basements do in Roanoke, storm season is exactly when you’ll find out whether or not it’s doing its job. We handle sump pump repair and installation, and we can even test your pump before the next heavy rain to ensure it’s working properly. This simple maintenance step is a lot cheaper than replacing a failed pump after heavy storm damage.

Every repair our experts recommend is covered by our Southern Trust Lifetime Repair Guarantee. When we recommend a repair, we guarantee it stays free from defect in materials and workmanship, under normal conditions, for as long as you own the home.

Get Ahead of the Next Roanoke Downpour

The best time to deal with a sewer line is on a dry Tuesday, when you’re choosing the appointment instead of the storm choosing it for you.

If your drains have been gurgling, if the basement smells off after it rains, or if you have simply never had a look at what’s under the yard, all of this is worth a conversation. Our expert team will explain all your options with upfront pricing before any work begins. Further, financing is available and we’re proud to offer discounts for military members and first responders.

Southern Trust Home Services has served Roanoke area homeowners for over 30 years and is BBB accredited with an A+ rating, operating under Virginia Class A Contractor License #2705040708. We proudly serve Roanoke, Salem, Vinton, Cave Spring, Blacksburg, Christiansburg, Bedford, Rocky Mount, Floyd, and communities throughout Amherst, Bedford, Botetourt, Campbell, Craig, Floyd, Franklin, Montgomery, Patrick, Pulaski, Roanoke, and Wythe Counties. Just call (540) 264-3890 or schedule your service online today to get started.