[hummingbird]

Why the hell would they put their emergency generator in their basement in one of the countries worst flood zones?

Houston Medical Center also did that (generators in the basement) and suffered enormously during a flood a few years back. Lost MRI and other expensive medical equipment, years of medical research, had to move patients on stretchers down darkened stairwells. It was abysmal. It cost a fortune to repair. Medical waste was floating around like in NO right now.

[AnAmericanMother]

They put their generators in the basement because they are HEAVY.

If you put them on an upper floor, the underpinnings may have to be specially reinforced . . . plus there's the problem of getting the monsters upstairs (especially if they exceed the freight elevator's rating).

But that's a case of penny wise, pound foolish. About two thirds of the way up and near the elevator shaft is probably a good bet, but I'd defer to any civil engineers around here . . . I'm just a former insurance investigator with a little experience in structural collapses . . .