DeCamp Gardens neighbors working to clean as waters recede

ELKHART, Ind. - Neighbors who live in DeCamp Gardens are working to clean up their homes as the waters recede.

"This is the first time we’ve ever seen anything this major," said Mark Martin, who's lived in his home on DeCamp Boulevard for 21 years.

Now, as we canoe down the street, we see mailboxes nearly submerged, a van almost completely underwater, and houses gone dark.

However, by Thursday night, the water has receded so much that Mark and his son, Jared, had to get out and pull the canoe they were paddling just that morning.

“It’s really gone down, I mean I can’t tell you how deep it was," said Mark.

He estimates that at its deepest, the water level had risen to well over six feet.

Luckily, Martin's home is on higher ground.

“We had water up to this point right here, and that’s about 15 inches, which is a lot lower than the whole neighborhood," he said.

But, he says they're still working on getting that water line to "zero."

Mark says he has two sump pumps, one sprinkler pump, and several pool pumps working to empty his basement.

“What happens back here is the water rises, and this is actually the groundwater soaking in, so it finds the little holes in the concrete, and it comes in," he said.

Mark thinks it could take a couple weeks before the water completely recedes, because as they're pumping it out, it's coming in through the cracks.

“So this may take a couple weeks, because we’re pumping water out, but it’s coming in at the same time.”