Basement drain - block it up?

[R D S]

There is a culvert near our property and a drain in our basement.

Under heavy rain, water will occasionally come up the drain. In the past the amount has been small, a minor inconvenience with a mop, but lately it's been much more dramatic. Last week there was about 18 inches of water down there, which eventually drained back out leaving everything covered in silt. Yesterday it pissed down again, there wasn't as much water but it had sewage in it.

So can anyone thing of a good reason not to block this drain up?

I get that water can come into the basement by other means but given that it never has I reckon it would be best to block theh drain and use a pump if it became necessary.

[Jethro_uk]

my worry would be that if water can't come out of *that* drain, where

*would* it come out of .....

[R D S]

There are basements under all the shops in the row, the neighbours can have my share!

[R D S]

Thanks for all the input.

What I have done is connected a pipe approx 3 foot long to the drain hole. The drain hole is actually 4 inch so got one of those rubber flanged things to shove in it and connected a length of soil pipe to it.

Given the way it fills up, slowly and without any pressure behind it, I am assuming that it follows the level of some source elsewhere and that now a level will rise in the pipe.

Fingers crossed.