WATER EXTRACTION

WATER EXTRACTION CARPET:

1. The first thing to do is to move all your items up and off the wet carpet. Go look under your bed and see if you have any pictures or keep sakes. Move toughs’ items to a safe and dry place. Start to clear off the table tops and so forth till the room is empty. Then move the furniture out of the room.

2. Start extracting the water from the top of the carpet. Start working in the back corner of the room and move back or forward, and work your way toward the door. After the carpet is extracted you can address the padding under the carpet.

3. Carefully pull the corner of the carpet up and always from the wall. This will expose the wet pad and you began to extract that. Roll the wet carpet out of the way and continue to work on the padding till you have all the water removed.

DRAIN THE CEILINGS AND WALLS

Ceilings:

Check for sagging ceilings. Drain them carefully as shown in step 2. If the floodwaters went above your ceiling, you should replace it if it is made of wallboard. A plaster ceiling will dry eventually, but if it has too many cracks or sags, you will have to tear it down and replace it. Remove any wet insulation in the ceiling to allow the joists to dry.

Walls:

Remove water trapped within your walls. To check for water, take off the baseboard. Stick an awl or knife into the wall about 2 inches above the floor (just above the 2x4 wood sill plate). If water drips out, cut or drill a hole large enough to allow water to drain freely. (Use a hand or cordless drill or saw to avoid shock.) If you are going to replace the wallboard anyway, you don’t have to be neat: use a hammer to know out a hole.
If your walls are plaster, a knife won’t penetrate them. Drill a hole above the sill plate to drain the water. (Use a hand or cordless drill or saw to avoid shock.) Do not use a hammer or chisel on plaster because the plaster could shatter.

In a newer home, you may have metal sill plates. A metal sill acts as a gutter at the bottom of the wall cavity. Drill a hole at the floor level to drain water, using a hand or cordless drill.

Repeat the process to drain all the wall cavities. Depending on the spacing between studs in your walls, make a hole every 16 inches or every 24 inches. Watch out for the wiring, which is usually at the same height as your electrical outlets. If there is wet insulation, you will have to remove the wallboard in order to take out all the insulation.