Worst case yet...

Today was a doozie. We didn't even work the full day because of the severity of this house.
We pulled up about 9am, a nearby town to Cedar Falls. It looked a bit cluttered from the outside with boxes, bins and storage cases scattered along the front lawn. Our supervisor told us to swab some mentholatum under our noses to kill the smell a bit. We geared up, put on our masks and made our way to the basement. The reeky smell wafted towards us as we approached the house, which the homeowners are STILL living on the first floor! The smell, if I can explain it, was something like rotten eggs, heavy, throaty, choky methane gas, rotting, bacteriated life, followed by an acidic fumey kicker in your eyes. WHAT DID THEY HAVE DOWN THERE!?!!
The whole team was awesome through it!! I was so proud of everyone...we grabbed our buckets, goulashes and trudged to the 8 inch water drenched basement floor to round up all the water/smell logged items. (Mind you all of the houses we've worked on have been free of standing water, this was the first house with 8 inches of water still pouring in...because of the high water table. All of the pumping out of water was replaced shortly thereafter with more amounts of field water, ugh!!) The basement was ill-lit and the mold ridden walls, and dark ground water created an eerie feel. I could hear voices of my teammates in the back of the basements astonished at the condition of the articles, and the still sounds of water rushing past moving boots...it was the worse house we've seen yet!
Dan, our supervisor called it a day at about 1pm...saying that the work was above our heads, we don't have the proper equipment and the situation needed higher considerations. The homeowners were thankful for the work we did...but they were like zombies. They were rummaging through the garbage pile, trying to salvage memories that were married to their items. It was sad. Their tearful goodbye/thank you was saddening. They were so overwhelmed and mentally exhausted that they could hardly weigh the amount of work left to the work we completed. Ahhh. I was confused.

I didn't have my camera today but my teammate did, so once I get ahold of the pics I will post them.

Nechama, the organization we're working with, is hosting a small, quaint BBQ for us and some other local volunteers tonight at the place we're staying at. It should be nice.

More to come later.
Hugs,
Becca