---
title: "Brothers Build Clever System to Keep Their Family Home Dry While Everything Around It Floods"
description: "A man and his brother in western Tennessee deployed a clever system to save their family home from devastating river flood."
date: "2025-04-18"
modified: "2025-04-18"
authors:
  - name: "Victor Tangermann"
    job_title: "Senior Editor"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/brothers-flood-levees-protect-home"
categories:
  - "Science & Energy"
tags:
  - "flood"
  - "storm"
  - "tennessee"
  - "the digest"
---

# Brothers Build Clever System to Keep Their Family Home Dry While Everything Around It Floods

![A man and his brother in western Tennessee deployed a clever system to save their family home from devastating river flood.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/brothers-flood-levees-protect-home2.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: \<a href="https://www.facebook.com/randy.moore.77312/videos/686583957142429" target="\_blank"\>Randy Moore via Facebook\</a\>\</em\>*

## Levee Johnston

A man and his brother in western Tennessee deployed a clever system to save their family home from devastating river surges triggered by a catastrophic storm earlier this month.

As the [*Washington Post* reports](<https://www.washingtonpost.com/weather/2025/04/15/tennessee-floods-mississippi-river/>), farmers Tucker Humphrey and his brother Justin constructed levees with an excavator that saved the house from flooding.

Dazzling [aerial footage](<https://x.com/foxweather/status/1912445873788797332>) of the flood shows the home and its surrounding rectangular property virtually untouched by the brown floodwater that has engulfed everything else in the region.

The idea of constructing a levee, a technique that humans have [known about and deployed for many thousands of years](<https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2015/08/a-brief-history-of-levees/402119/>), was passed down from the two brothers' father, who died several years ago, according to *WaPo*.

"Just normal things around here," Tucker Humphrey told the newspaper. "Doing what we have to do to save the house."

https://twitter.com/foxweather/status/1912445873788797332

## Paul Wall

To protect the home, the pair constructed a barrier up to nine feet tall in certain places.

And as it turns out, the artificial embankment was sorely needed. In just hours, the Obion River, which runs adjacent to their hometown of Bogota, rose nine feet at the beginning of April.

Around 100 people had to be rescued in the area. The storm itself, which tore through much of the South, [killed more than 30 people](<https://www.forbes.com/sites/conormurray/2025/03/16/at-least-34-dead-as-storms-rip-through-south-and-midwest/>).

The Humphreys have no plan to move away from the flood-prone area, and are ready to construct even higher barriers.

"I’ll build it 30 feet tall if I got to," Tucker told the *WaPo*.

**More on floods:** *[Flood Wreaks Havoc on NASA Spacecraft](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/flood-nasa-spacecraft>)*

## Author
I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida.

### Author social links  
[Bluesky](<https://bsky.app/profile/vtanger.bsky.social>)