Flooding in apartment building
This apartment building had a pipe burst on the third floor. Over the course of a couple hours, the time it took for it to be noticed, the water rushing out of that pipe made it all the way down to the basement. We came out as soon as we could, got the water shut off and started extraction and damage control.
extraction
Once the water is stopped one of the early steps on the first day we go out on any water call is to extract as much of the water as possible to bring down the overall dry time. These floors will be steam cleaned at the end of the restoration to insure they are water and mold free. The more water we remove the less water the dehumidifier and air movers have to worry about. During this step wet materials will be removed too, also to lessen the amount of moisture the equipment will have to take care of.
Containment
Containment is set up to focus dry areas. This can bring dry times down by quite a bit if the water is in a large open area. This will not always be necessary for water restoration, but it can make a big difference in rooms that have water only in a small part of the room.
Wet ceiling removal
The affected ceiling tiles are removed to get more wet, unsalvageable materials out of the drying area.
Equipment setup
During and after extraction equipment will be setup, dehumidifiers, air movers, and air scrubbers (situationally).
Moisture readings
Any and all walls are tested for moisture. These meters will detect if there is moisture on the other side of the drywall, so if the front appears dry, but there is water behind we will know to remove the wall. Removing these wall will prevent more damage either from water or, further down the line, mold.
additional demo
Once the moisture readings are done, walls reading wet are removed. The bottom two feet of all walls with wet flooring are removed as early as possible to stop water from wicking up the walls and doing anymore damage.
additional equipment
Once all the extraction and demo is done, additional equipment may be placed to improve dry time. We like to keep the dry time on any restoration job between 3-5 days.
Rebuild
After all the water is cleaned up and all affected areas are at acceptable levels of moisture, the rebuild process can happen. Fixes like this water pipe, are usually taken care of as soon as possible though, as opposed to at the end.