Flooded Basement

Flooded basements unfortunately happen in finished and unfinished basements. As homeowners, we take it for granted that our stockpiles of belongings are safe but a flooded basement can cause major damage.

There are many causes including clogged downspouts from guttering to failed sump pumps. Once the ground is saturated and it continues to rain, water will find its way in and the result is a flooded basement.

Once you ve discovered the flooded basement; the first step is to remove the water. If you have a sump pump, it often will remove the water but many times during extreme heavy rains, the sump pump will be overwhelmed thus not keeping up with the volume of water. Often the power will also fail which makes the sump pump useless unless you have a battery backup which can be good for only a short period of time.

If you have a flooded basement, you should turn up the heat in the winter and the air conditioner in the summer in this area which will help speed up the drying process while you call a professional. Using a wet shop vacuum is often major work and may give you a false sense of security that your structure is dry. Using fans to dry without the heavy duty dehumidifiers that professionals use results in just blowing moist air from one side of room to the other.

A professional will extract the water and place a series of air movers along with commercial dehumidifiers to speed the drying process and monitor the relative humidity and thus help eliminate the possibility of mold.

The best advice always: Call a professional when you have a flooded basement!