Expert: James Ball - 7/23/2010

Question
I have 34 yr old ranch home in Madison, WI with a wood fireplace on the main floor. The base of the fireplace structure goes all the way down to the basement where it has access panels to clean out the ashes. Last night, we had extremely heavy rainfall, possibly 6 inches of rain. This morning, I noticed some water puddling around around one side of the concrete block base of the fireplace. It looks like the water originated from that area somehow rather than settling there from a different area of the basement. How concerned should I be about this? What should I check into, if anything? The top of the chimney on the roof is exposed and does not have any type of cap on it right now.

Answer
Hello Matt, could this be ground water? 6" is a lot of rain and if the ground is soaked it will come into the home, if it was coming down the chimney of the fireplace it would be in the fireplace.
look into better drainage around the base of your chimney and that side of the house
James