Mayor: Human error could be factor in Somerville flooding

SOMERVILLE, Mass. -- This weekend's flash flooding left Somerville underwater and the mayor said human error may be to blame.

Saturday’s flood shut down Somerville Police headquarters and several other buildings around the city, causing thousands of dollars of damage.

“We’re pushing over a million dollars at this point, just the replacement of equipment, cleanup costs, system upgrades that need to be done, electrical co-generation 911,” said Somerville Mayor Joseph Curtatone.

Curtatone said the pumps at a nearby dam were not on Saturday when that storm hit.

“Well we know the pumps at the Amelia Earhart Sam weren’t operating at the time of the flood,” said Curtatone.

Curtatone said that just because the pumps were not on when the storm hit does not necessarily mean the person who controls the dam wasn’t doing their job.

“This was a ferocious storm coming at such a great rate of speed and so much water; they were estimating two inches an hour. We may have gotten three here,” said Curtatone.

The downpour only lasted about 90 minutes, but it did plenty of damage in that short time. An entire underpass nearly filled to the brim, while several homes, business, schools and buildings sustained water damage.

Five thousand sandbags were placed outside of the Capuano Early Childhood Center to prevent the next storm from creating more damage.

The worst damage was to the police department, where nearly half the fleet of 55 cars and motorcycles was damaged.

"The results are sobering. We have, at a minimum, eight of our police cruisers which are a total loss,” Curtatone said.

Curtatone said the city is now conducting an in-depth investigation to find out how it happened, what --if anything-- went wrong and how they could make sure it doesn’t happen again.

“After procedures were followed, but it didn’t help, do they need to be changed,” said Curtatone.

All 911 calls in town are once again going through Somerville.

There are two pumps inside police headquarters for precautionary reasons.

Air quality testing will take place inside the headquarters on Wednesday, and will take at least a week for the results to come back.

The Somerville Police headquarters may not open for another week or two.

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