Yesterday, the man who installed our new heat pump and furnace dropped by to finish up a couple minor details. When he left, I closed the garage door, and as it was lowering, I heard the weirdest sound. I thought something large and heavy was sliding over or down the wall. I inspected the entire garage but found nothing.
I didn't think more of it until about 6:30pm when Scott pulled in. I heard the garage door start to open. Then it stopped. He tried it again. And again. It would raise about 6 inches, then stop. I went out to see if I could help or see if something was obstructing. We found an emergency release, and determined that the opening mechanism was working fine -- the problem was the door itself.
The whole time we were trying to figure out what was wrong, I was thinking about that strange sound the last time the door operated correctly.
Then I noticed that one side of the bar across the door looked different than the other side. I asked Scott about it. He looked at it and the mystery was solved. One side of the massively-huge spring that helps raise this massively-heavy door had snapped. I had no idea a spring snapping would sound like that, but that's clearly what I heard.
Of course, it was long past the time when all door companies close for the night.
We also had an ice storm hit last night. It will continue through today. Scott's car is out there with a layer of ice on it. And our van, with Elli's wheelchair ramp, is stuck inside. We are effectively paralyzed.
