Thornton septic emergencies tend to come from one of three places: the Pemi coming up after a big rain, a ski house holding twice as many people as it was built for on a holiday weekend, or a line that froze while the place sat empty. Different causes, same phone call — nothing is draining and you need it pumped.
Start with the river. In August 2011 Tropical Storm Irene came through after a month of rain that had already left the ground soaked. The Pemigewasset gauge at Woodstock, just upstream of Thornton, crested at 16.5 feet against a flood stage of nine. It is still the highest reading on record there. A leach field on the valley floor near the river has nowhere to put water when the ground under it is already full, and when that happens the tank backs up into the house no matter how recently it was pumped.
Then there is the winter crowd. Thornton sits between two ski areas, and on holiday weekends and February vacation week a lot of houses here are full — a chalet with a three-bedroom septic design and ten people in it, everybody showering after skiing, the dishwasher running twice a day. That is a lot more water than the field is used to, and it arrives all at once. Sunday morning is when we hear about it.
Last, the empty houses. More than a third of the housing in town sits vacant at any given time, and a lot of that is second homes that see no one from March to December or the other way around. Shut off the heat, leave a little water in a trap or a line, get a winter with thin snow cover, and the pipe between the house and the tank freezes. You find out the first night you are back.
If you rent the house, leave a one-page note for guests that says how many people it sleeps, what not to flush, and what to do if a drain backs up. It is the cheapest emergency prevention there is.
Stop putting water in. No showers, no laundry, no dishwasher, flush only when you have to. Every gallon makes it worse. If it is a rental with guests in it, tell them now rather than letting them find out the hard way.
Find the lid if you can. If you know where the tank is, clear the snow off it. If you do not, tell us on the phone and we will plan for the time it takes to find it.
Tell us about the driveway. A pump truck is heavy. If the driveway is steep, unplowed, or soft from rain, say so when you call so we can figure out where to park and how much hose to bring.
If the river is up, say that too. Pumping a tank while the field is underwater will get the house working again for a while, but the tank will fill back up until the ground drains. We will tell you that honestly instead of letting you think one pump-out fixed it.
Emergency response runs $400–$700 for a standard tank, which covers the pump-out and a diagnosis while the lid is open. Time of day, distance and how much hose we need move you inside that range. A frozen line that needs thawing instead of pumping is quoted once we see it. You get the number before we start.
For a while. Pumping empties the tank and gets the house usable again. But if the field is sitting in saturated ground, the tank fills back up until the water table drops. In the meantime, use as little water as you possibly can. Once things dry out we can check whether the field took any lasting damage.
Have them stop using water right away — no showers, no dishwasher, no laundry. Then call us with the address and how many people are in the house. Too many people for the system on a busy weekend is common here. A pump-out usually gets things going again, and we can tell you if the system is undersized for how the house is being rented.
If the house sat empty with the heat off or low and this winter had thin snow cover, a frozen line is the most likely cause. Do not keep running water to try to push it through. Call us. We will check whether the tank is full or the line is frozen, and thaw or pump as needed.
Sometimes not, and it is better to know that on the phone than at the bottom of your hill. Tell us how steep it is and whether it is plowed. We carry long hose for exactly this, and in a lot of cases we can park on the road and still reach the tank.
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