It's cleanup time in White Center after pipe bursts

In his soggy White Center house, resident Ron Stokes studied his red guitar signed by the Canadian rock band Loverboy.

After spotting mud and cracks next to the band members' autographs, he screamed.

In the family's mud-filled basement, his wife, Kem, leaned over dressers, searching for jewelry and mumbling about a nervous breakdown.

The Stokes and other residents in this South King County neighborhood mopped up Thursday and salvaged what they could after thousands of gallons of water flooded houses the day before.

A crack in a 16-inch cast-iron pipe occurred near 26th Avenue Southwest and Southwest 106th Street, causing drinking water to spill for more than three hours, Seattle Public Utilities reported.

A horizontal rupture in a 50-year-old pipe grew to 12 feet, utilities spokesman Andy Ryan said. Neighbors described the scene as a river and said there was little they could do to stop it.

"Our hearts go out to these people, and we will do everything within our power to get them back on their feet," Ryan said.

He was uncertain Thursday how much water had escaped from the pipe. But utilities officials were taking the accident seriously.

"If it was our infrastructure and a likely pipe failure, which looks like what happened, then we will have (financial) responsibility in this case," he said.

Since the main broke, utilities representatives have passed out claim forms in the area in which about 100 houses lost service for an extended period. Ryan said he believes water hit about 12 houses.

Investigators, he added, will make their findings public as to what exactly happened. But corrosion, shifting of the ground or roadway vibrations can cause pipes to break, he said.

At the Stokes' house on 26th Avenue Southwest, a friend called Wednesday to alert them about the water. Daughter Veronica Stokes, 13, looked out the window and cried, "Oh, my gosh!"

Her father, 44, went outside and realized water reached his shins. His first thought was saving the family's hope chest, which sat in the basement and contained family documents and photos.

He succeeded in doing that. But as he stood in the basement, he watched the water rise above his shoes. "Then I watched my bed and TV start floating before me," he recalled. "It was eerie."

In about 10 minutes, water filled the basement and rose to about 8 feet.

It had entered through a 20-square- foot sinkhole next to the foundation and with such force that the family's washer and dryer twisted.

Mud caked the family's clothing in the basement. "We just washed our clothing," Veronica Stokes said.

While wedding photos were submerged, the family succeeded on Thursday in finding Ron Stokes' wedding ring.

Their 15-year-old son, Andrew, waded through the outside water Wednesday, hoping to see the flooded basement through a window. In an instant, he was waist high in the cold water.

He had found the sinkhole. "I didn't touch the bottom," he said.

From there, the water rushed down a slope and flooded the home of Debi Stokes, a relative. Her husband called and said, "Houston, we have a problem."

"Usually, he exaggerates," she said. "But in the whole backyard, you couldn't see any grass."

The water left her house through the front door and garage. It also went around it. It crossed 25th Avenue Southwest and soaked another house before it stopped.

Ron Stokes was uncertain Thursday where he and his family were going to live. "We don't know if our house is structurally sound," he said.