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Rain Storm Causes Plumbing Backups.

Areas of the country that have earthquake activity suffer from cracked "soil pipes". A soil pipe is a plumbing term to describe the pipe that carries waste water from a building. The earth movement cracks the pipes and this causes sand and silt along with plant and tree roots to get into the pipes. The water flow becomes restricted. Over time much of the waste water will escape into the ground. The ground is able to accept the water and filter the waste water so that contamination is not usually a problem. As long as the ground that surrounds the pipe is dry it will be able to adsorb  the waste water that leaks from the crack pipes. As soon as the ground becomes wet and saturated by rain water it can no longer accept the waste water leaking out of the crack pipes, at least not at the same rate. Often the waste water will back up into the building as it did in this coffee shop. To solve the problem from happening again, the pipes may need to be cleaned out and or replaced