Water Extraction and Water Damage Cleanup: Should You Attempt This on Your Own?

6/30/2017 (Permalink)

SERVPRO of East Central Austin Professionals are available 24 hours/7 days a week and will respond quickly to a restoration emergency.

Water Extraction and Water Damage Cleanup in Austin

If your Austin home or business has experienced a flood or extensive water damage, you’ll need sufficient time to review the damage and determine what you’ve lost. Whether or not the restoration is something you can handle on your own will likely weigh on whether the water damage is minimal or excessive, and if you require water extraction.

If you do require water extraction, then you may not want to tackle this on your own, especially if your Austin home or business is severely flooded. In that case it's best to reach out to a water extraction and water damage restoration company like our local SERVPRO office.

If you have minor water damage it may not be difficult to handle the cleanup on your own, but you should be cautious, especially if you come across mold or other issues typically related to water damage.

While you’re determining if this is something that you can handle on your own, you need to be aware of the impact and long-term effects that extensive water damage can have on your health, safety and your home or business. If you’re up for the challenge and are sure that you can take this on by yourself, please be aware of the following risks and be prepared:

Assessing and Preparing for Water Damage Cleanup & Water Extraction

Before getting started with any type of water damage cleanup or extraction, it’s important to follow some basic safety procedures:

1. First, you have to be sure that your home or business is safe to enter. Electrical problems can be tricky, so if there is damage that might have caused electrical problems, like downed or exposed wires, or if there is so much water and you need water extraction and you’re not sure that you should go in, then don’t risk it. Best thing to do is to get in touch with an electrician, who will check if your power lines and circuits are secured before you begin. If it looks as if too much damage has occurred, they you may clearly have electrical problems.

2. Be sure that that there are no potential gas leaks or additional fire hazards. Be sure to have a battery-powered flashlight with you at all times. Never use a lighter or matches if there’s even the slightest chance of a leak. A spark from a match or a lighter can ignite a fire, so be very careful.

3. As there are a variety of cleaning solutions out there, you should be cautious when selecting the right one. Pure chlorine bleach works, but so does ammonia and vinegar…however, you should never mix any of these together, as they can create an extremely toxic and harmful chlorine gas. Do some investigative work to see which one is the best for this type of project and use only that one.

4. It’s important, before you begin, that you have plenty of protective clothing, such as goggles, boots, rubber gloves and especially a respirator, because some the air may be toxic. You should be fully protected as any floodwater water damaged material may be riddled with contaminants.

5. Keep a look out for animals. All kinds of insects and other creatures can be attracted by Austin floodwater. Snakes, fire ants and mosquitoes are just of the few that can be drawn to water…so be careful.

It’s no secret that cleaning is a very crucial part of the water damage cleanup process; it’s not something that can be done overnight. Many of the items in your Austin home or business may in fact be salvageable, but you may find that some things just have to go. In this case it’s best to reach out to a water damage specialist, otherwise you may find yourself doing all of the cleaning, water extraction and repairs on your own.

Of course, you may feel that you need to get right in and start cleaning right away, but before you embark on any type of cleaning or cleanup, you’ll need to make sure that all the water is removed and that all the relative elements of your Austin property are properly dried out.

Let’s look at wood floors: if you have wood floors, and it turns out that they’re fully soaked, they’ll have to properly dry out before you can do any type of water damage restoration. You may actually have to remove and replace all of the floors if it’s that bad. Venturing into new construction, before the structure is completely dry, will also be problematic as you may encounter mold, which over time will cause your property to deteriorate. It’s very important to make sure that everything is dried out before you even begin moving forward.

Our local SERVPRO company uses top-quality drying equipment for our water damage cleanup & restoration jobs. Keep in mind that if you're not entirely sure of the extent of your damage, or whether you're really capable of cleaning it up properly on your own (remember, some effects of water damage may not be all that noticeable at first) then you should be safe and contact a professional water extraction and water damage restoration company, like our Austin-based SERVPRO company.

Other issues, such as mud, food and water safety, home furnishing restoration, and how to deal with wet floors and walls, among others will be covered in Part 2 of this article, Tips on Dealing with Major Water Damage Issues.