Four feet of water filled Apollo Home's offices on Madison Road in Oakley on Friday, July 17, destroying every desk, cubicle, and workstation inside the HVAC and plumbing company's building. Knudsen said Apollo Home was one of roughly 20 businesses that flooded along a single stretch of Madison Road that evening.

"Every office, every desk, every cubicle in the building is a total loss," Mike Knudsen of Apollo Home told WKRC on Saturday, July 18. "There's a sick irony of we're really good at cleaning up messes, then here we are cleaning up our own."

Oakley bore the worst of Friday's storm. The neighborhood logged 33 flood-related incident calls, more than any other Cincinnati neighborhood, according to city data released Saturday by Cincinnati Fire Department Assistant Chief Matt Flagler. Hyde Park followed with 20 calls, Pleasant Ridge with 19, and Madisonville with 18.

Gauge readings submitted to the National Weather Service of Wilmington showed Oakley received between 4.4 and 6.6 inches of rain Friday. National Weather Service meteorologist James Gibson called the storm an "anomaly," saying stagnant thunderstorms parked over the east side rather than moving through.

Residents in the area said it took only 20 to 30 minutes for the downpour to become a serious flood threat, according to WCPO.

At Apollo Home, employees still on site Friday evening had to pile into a company box truck and evacuate as the parking lot submerged. Most of the company's service vans were spared because they are take-home vehicles that employees had already driven off the lot. Thirty workers gave up their Saturday to gut the building. Knudsen said a city retaining wall near the property helped limit some of the damage.

The Metropolitan Sewer District of Greater Cincinnati fielded more than 600 calls for service Friday night, Flagler said. The Cincinnati Fire Department responded to 40 water rescues citywide over several hours beginning at 5:42 p.m., with police dispatched alongside firefighters for 15 of those rescues.

Flagler said Saturday he had not seen a flooding event of this scale since 2016.

The flooding also hit businesses closer to Hyde Park Square. Neko Sushi owner Yeon Kim, whose Edwards Road restaurant flooded for the fifth time since 2018, told WCPO the city needs to address the area's drainage. Kim said having only two sewage drains near her business is the core problem and that she has contacted city council multiple times without resolution. Poeme owner Kristen Folzenlogen, whose stationery store on Michigan Avenue also flooded, told WCPO the sewage systems cannot handle the volume of water in such a short window.

The city maintains the Duck Creek Channel flood protection system on Cincinnati's east side, which includes one pump station and the Madison Road floodgate. An unverified social media report claimed the floodgate failed to close Friday; the city has not publicly addressed the claim.

Affected businesses and residents can file a claim through MSD's Sewer Backup Program online at msdgc.org or by calling 513-352-4900. The Hyde Park Neighborhood Council warned Saturday that claimants have only 48 hours from the event to file so MSD can investigate. Residents who spot clogged storm drains can call 311.