We bought our house from my wife's parents who built a new place I feel to avoid the crawlspace. Anyway it was in mid January 2 years ago with the temperature about 15 degrees below zero. We were in the bedroom at about 11 PM when I heard water running below our floor. Right away I knew that a pipe had burst. I put on an old rain suit and took a flashlight and went outside. I pulled insulation from the access and crawled in. I had less than a foot of clearance because of a rotten subfloor that my father-in-law had poured a cement slab over. A nail snagged my back as I slithered through the lake that had formed as the pipe gushed water. To my further dismay and discomfort I discovered that the crotch was out of my rubber suit. I thought I was in Hell! When I finally closed the valve and crawled out I was soaked inside out. My wife expressed sympathy but had to laugh because my entire front was a bright pink from exposure to the icy water that had entered my suit. Since then I have removed the subfloor and dug over 50 wheelbarrows of dirt from that space and insulated all the water pipes....never again!John B. Snodgrass
