Foundation Offices Hit by Flood
On April 14th, 2005 Mary Katherine and I arrived to the rushing sound water and a flooded office and warehouse. A mis-installed plumbing fixture by our landlord in our bathroom gave way in the early morning and was spraying water everyway, penetrating through walls and flowing into other offices covering floor and carpet in about 2″ of water. . I jumped into the fray, in a suit no less (planning to attend the City Park of Durham annual fundraiser), and shoved the fixture back on to the gushing hose. Water went everywhere, but was able to hold the position for about 45 mnutes until the plumber arrived to cut the lines.
Our landlord accepted no blame, though the plumber said the fixture was completely misinstalled, and our insurance company was extremely difficult in giving us any money. We suffered loss to computer equipment, stored on the ground (now everything is on platforms), product and files. We suffered 10 days during the height of our season without being able to ship or use our offices. Phone service was down because our computers were off for we use VOIP, voice over internet, to save money.
This event adds to many in our history, from typhoons hitting Madagascar and knocking out bridges, to coups disrupting our shipments, to large customers cancelling orders after the product was in stock. We notified our customers of the problem and apologized for service disruption. Sadly, few seemed to to care (disaster overload).
We are asking you to consider placing an order with Forests of the World or making a contribution to The Forest Foundation to help us “weather the storm.” We are taking donations for a number of projects, including Bande Aceh, Indonesia and Sri Lanka, whose workshops were devastated by the Tsunami in December. We definitely empathize with the affect of water.
Thank you for your help.