Vandals cause sewer backups in northwest Lincoln

People around 9th and Adams streets in northwest Lincoln woke up to a foul odor in their homes only to realize their basements were backed up with sewer water. 

“We have a shower in the basement that had like 6 inches in it, and that overflowed into our bathroom part and just got a little carpet wet and stuff like that… went down our hallway a little bit. The drain in front of our washer filled up a little bit, but we’re nothing like my neighbors,” Jim Mohr, a homeowner in the neighborhood, said. 

City officials explained to us what happened.

“At that particular man hole, there’s a small hole, it’s called a pick hole which allows you to take the manhole lid off and it’s about 3/4 inch in diameter, and it’s just big enough that I think somebody just took this air hose and threaded it down through the hole, and then it just went a little ways down into the sewer and then caused the blockage,” Brian Kramer, Lincoln Waste Water superintendent, said. 

Mohr’s neighbor told him to check his basement; he said he’s thankful she did because they rarely use it. 

Just a few hours after he checked his basement, they got the majority of it cleaned. 

Mohr’s neighbor, Desirae, wasn’t as lucky. 

“I looked all over our basement and all of the rooms that are down here were full of water,” Desirae Soloirio, a resident in the neighborhood, said. 

Desirae called the city to 9th and Adams around 9:00 a.m. Thursday morning, that’s when they discovered the air compressor hose stuck in the sewage system. 

“That hose had not been in there for more than a couple of days, and then finally enough debris got stuck on it that it started occurring this morning,” Kramer said. 

Because the city thinks it was an act of vandalism, it is unclear if the city will be liable for any damage. 

“The claims are different under different circumstances, and we’ll really have to wait and see until they can put their official report together,” Kramer said. 

Right now the victims are trying to clean up their basements and collect what they can. 

“We really couldn’t do anything other than gather what we could that wasn’t sopping wet that we wanted to salvage to get it upstairs,” Desirae said. 

If you have any information on this act of vandalism, call police.