What is Lurking in that Water Damage?

8/8/2021 (Permalink)

A refrigerator leak can cause significant damage if not treated quickly.

If you’ve ever had a flood in your home, you may have heard the term “category” followed by a number. For most homeowners, that doesn’t really mean a whole lot, but from a mitigation perspective, it means a whole lot.

Categories of water determine the process necessary to clean up and how careful you should be in dealing with the mess.

Three Types of Contamination

Category 1

There are three categories of water that can infiltrate your home or business. The first, Category 1, is sanitary water that typically comes from a broken pipe and doesn’t come in contact with any contaminants that could mix into it. It doesn’t pose a risk to your safety if you’re exposed to it, but can still easily cause mold if not treated immediately.  

Category 2

This water contains significant amounts of contaminants that may cause harm to a person should they come in contact. Flooding from your washing machine into your home, or aquariums, or punctured waterbeds. This water could already harbor bacteria and shouldn't touch your skin and should quickly be taken care of to prevent further issues.  After just two days, Cat 2 water damage can easily become a Category 3.

Category 3

This water is heavily contaminated by sewage. If water comes in from a sewer drain in any way, or back flows from the drains in your home, it requires extreme levels of caution. Toxins and pathogens are extremely harmful to humans and pets, and should be treated with the utmost care.  Professionals should be wearing protective gear to clean up those messes.

Our expert team takes these situations very seriously. We have a response time of 1 hour or less to start the water damage repair process to keep it from spreading and worsening. We’re available 24/7 to protect your home, you, and your family.

Water Loss Tips

Water damages happen quite frequently, some of the most common causes that we see are from: failed supply lines from a toilet or fridge, water coming from outside the home, or leaks in the home bathroom.

When experiencing a water damage in your Pocatello home you should first:

-Shut off the water

-Call your insurance agent

-Call SERVPRO to begin emergency services

When dealing with a water loss from a clean water source which is considered to be a Category 1 loss. Most of your building materials that are wet can be salvaged and restored to preloss conditions. We have the ability to dry and salvage important documents due to water loss.

Helpful Tip

When shopping for a Home Owners Insurance policy a thing to consider is looking into a Flood policy. There have been many times that the cause of loss has been water from an outside water source. In result the insurance policy didn’t cover the loss and the owner was responsible for the cost.

Our team understands how stressful any type of loss can be. We pride ourselves on customer service and quick response times. All our technicians are background checked, drug tested, and are certified through the IICRC.

Their certifications range from Water Restoration Technician, Applied Structural Drying, Commercial Drying Specialist, and Applied Microbial Remediation Technician. Click the IICRC link to learn more about these certifications.