You mean the water isn't supposed to be there?

The contractor dropped by this morning to find out if we were freaking out about the flood.  Guess what? We are now! He is having our engineer come by to discuss the problem. The basement was water-tight before they dug up three feet of dirt, so I assumed the water came in because we have 1/3 mud walls and no floor.  The contractor is concerned about the amount of water and says we may have to dig a trench around the entire perimeter of the house (yes outside) and put down new weeping tile. YIKES!  This is NOT what we want to hear.  Better to find out now I suppose.  Still I think he is a little ahead of himself.  It rained continuously for three days and three nights and there is no sump pump or anything at all down there to drain the water away.  Of course it collected. I am not actually worried - yet!
Here are some photos from today's progress.  You can see the holes where they will put the new foundation. You can also see the muck!  The boiler is on a little island.