The Dangers of Secondary Damage After a Water Event

6/17/2022 (Permalink)

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If your home in Clearfield, UT, suffers from any type of water damage, it could be susceptible to additional concerns after the initial cleanup. This could occur just a few days later or it could begin to reveal itself a week or two down the road. While black mold is one of the big concerns when water leaks into your home, you also need to be on the watch for lingering smells, deteriorating materials and spoiled carpeting.

The Best Defense Against Secondary Damage

A professional cleanup and restoration from an established water mitigation team is the best way to make sure the recovery process proceeds smoothly. The work will be done by highly-trained technicians who have been certified in the best techniques to clean up a house impacted by heavy storms, flooding or faulty plumbing.

Using standards accepted by the cleaning and restoration industry, the technicians will follow a checklist of proven procedures:

• Respond quickly to the situation
• Develop a sound restoration plan
• Remove standing water from the home
• Reduce areas of high humidity
• Restore and rebuild damaged areas

Lingering moisture can create the perfect conditions for black mold to form and grow on structures throughout your home. A professional team will make sure to treat excess moisture through proper ventilation, drying techniques and the use of fans. Technicians will also take measurements to determine the moisture level in the home, reducing it to about 30 to 60% indoor relative humidity so mold is unlikely to gain a foothold.

The Keys to Eliminating Odors

A poor cleanup job can lead to unpleasant odors after the work crew has left. These will only grow stronger over time, and they also hint at a harmful moisture level. Trained professionals will remove items that are too saturated to restore. This could include drywall, carpeting and insulation. Advanced techniques are used to remove wet insulation and replace it with new materials. Spoiled carpeting and padding will also be torn out and new carpeting will be installed if the damage is too great.

Specially formulated cleaning agents will be used to sanitize the home, killing pathogens and microbes that can grow and cause further damage. This helps deodorize the home. Unless the home is thoroughly cleaned with safe and effective agents, the possibility of returning smells is always possible.

The Answer to Black Mold Growth

Mold enjoys moist conditions and is more likely to trouble your home after any type of water leak or damage. All types of mold are potentially harmful to a home and they are all hard to eradicate as they leave microscopic spores that can colonize a new outbreak. This is especially true if your home still has high humidity levels or if the offending mold spores were not killed by powerful cleaning agents.

While a water leak in your home in Clearfield, UT,, is a challenging event, a professional cleanup and restoration process should take care of most issues. It will also make sure secondary damage in the form of mold growth or unpleasant odors does not cause trouble later on.