So I had one of those half-awake dreams over the weekend where I invented something amazing.
I was thinking of the flooded Queensland homes and all of the furniture and appliances being thrown on to the street because of water damage. One of my prized possessions is my sofa and I was wondering how I'd protect it if I was there.
Then I remembered that it was delivered in a very thick polyurethane bag that was bigger than a two man tent. Sure it had a few holes in it now, but a bit of gaffa (duct) tape would take care of those - at least enough to withstand a few days of water immersion.
But then I thought I could put loads of possessions on the sofa, in the same bag, and protect those too. In fact, what we need... is a flood bag!
I was going to be rich. And an award-winning saviour of Australian homes to boot! I went on...
So these giant bags, you could put them on anything - refrigerators, tables, TVs, the works. Sure, some might leak a bit, but total water immersion could be massively curtailed.
It would be worth getting as much air out of them as possible to prevent them floating and falling over. To this end it would be worth adding a valve that a vacuum cleaner could attach to and suck out all the air. Sure, some people wouldn't have time to do this in an emergency, and your vacuum might be martyred in the process, but just squeezing as much air as possible out, would help.
I had it all worked out.
Now just to check that no one had thought of it before. Off to Google.
Flood bags. A couple of hits. Rats.
First one...
It's sandbags. That's OK.
Next one. Hmm.
This was (and still is) an interesting blog page from the Katherine River area in Northern Territory dating back to 2007. Someone is saying exactly the same thing - but struggling to act on it. The suggestion made is to use Pallet Bags (heavy duty bags that cover goods which forklifts then carry around on pallets) and some suggestions are made on where to get them from. What's very obvious is that the makers of these bags don't want to know.
The next hit... a souvenir shopping bag emblazoned with the phrase, 'I survived the great Nashville flood.'
I'm going to be ric... Gah!
And there it was. Straight out of Florida, a large bona fide flood bag that's clearly had a lot of thought and development put into it and is already on sale. It's air and water tight, comes with restraining harnesses and even has desiccant sacks to stop mould forming - You can read all about them here.
There's also a web page for a patent on a bag which protects cars during floods. It's presented as silly, but after watching all those YouTube videos of car parks being inundated, you can bet that there are many Queenslanders who'd have loved to have had something like this.
But here's the rub... it seems you can't seem to buy floodbags anywhere. Not even in America. The manufacturer's website is dead too.
Even if they do exist, why aren't they here? Do they not work? Have we just not invented them yet? Surely, with billions of dollars worth of property being lost to water recently, these bags would have saved some people's possessions?
Perhaps some bright spark could get on to making/importing a load for Aussies on flood plains? It would surely be worth insurance companies buying them up and handing them out for free!
Just remember, when you've made your millions, and got your Order of Australia medal, to throw some love back to this civil servant, eh?
Source: http://www.abc.net.au/technology/articles/2011/01/31/3125544.htm
