NFM man to raise house after Hurricane Helene storm surge swamps neighborhood

Recovery from Hurricane Helene is well underway in Lochmoor Waterway Estates - a North Fort Myers neighborhood along the Caloosahatchee hit hard by the storm surge.

As Fox 4’s North Fort Myers Community Correspondent, I cover this area daily.

I went to take a look at the aftermath, and I talked with a homeowner who’s planning to raise his house to avoid piles of wet furniture and drywall from ever lining his driveway again.
Watch my report here...

Driving through the neighborhood, you could see waterlines that climb to doorhandles, restoration trucks in full force, and debris piles lining the streets. Dick Marting said his home was hit hard by the flooding.

“That’s where the water level came up to,” said Marting, pointing at the nearly two foot high water line on his garage door.

Austin Schargorodski

Just two years after Hurricane Ian, his newly renovated home flooded again. “We were sitting in the house, we stayed there all night and felt the water coming up little by little over our ankles. We’re thinking, this is happening all over again,” Marting recalled.

Marting walked me through the damage - you could see all the drywall cut out and repairs in the works. Marting said he’s grateful to the North Fort Myers Presbyterian Church for getting him back on track so quickly.

Austin Schargorodski

“They were all troopers,” said Marting. “They all came and worked like crazy to get the water up and all the debris out.”

Now, to avoid future floods, Marting said he planned to raise the house by six feet - until FEMA upped the requirements to a ten foot lift in this neighborhood.

Austin Schargorodski

“We had to go back through the whole engineering process and get all new engineering drawings because the high lift is different in terms of the engineering and all the stuff they do,” Marting explained.

Thankfully, Marting said new permits should clear in a few weeks, and he hopes to have the house lifted in three months. He said he’s excited to join neighbors also lifting their houses - especially before another storm.