Opinion ID: 1980020
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Whether the water on the Camerons' patio followed a defined course or channel.

Text: The Camerons next contend that the water on their patio was not surface water because, according to an affidavit by Mr. Cameron, the patio was designed to channel water to the driveway. They claim that the water on the patio was not lost by percolation, evaporation, or natural drainage, that it followed a defined course or channel, and that it therefore did not fall within the stipulated definition of surface water. In this case, regardless of the Camerons' purpose in sloping the patio, the water that landed on that structure flowed naturally down the stairs and into the basement. It did not follow a defined course or channel. Rather, the water located a means of natural drainage. The fact that the patio was intended to channel water to the driveway cannot alter the result where, as here, the water was never, in fact, channeled. See, e.g., Sherwood Real Estate, supra, 234 So.2d at 446-47 (water which had pooled on a roof that had been built with a slight incline to permit run-off was nevertheless surface water); Kossoff, supra, 170 N.Y.S.2d 789, 148 N.E.2d at 133 (water flowing from graded black top area was surface water). This case is unlike Heller, supra, 800 P.2d at 1009, relied on by the Camerons, in which the court held that melted snow had lost its character as surface water when it was funneled into man-made, six-inch deep trenches which diverted its regular path over a natural ridge. Here, the water did not lose its character as surface water, for the water was never channeled or diverted from its natural course.