Hurricane, Flood, and Water Damage Tips

Mandatory evacuations during hurricanes and floods are not always fun to have to deal with and even during hurricane Katrina, some people did not wish to evacuate their homes and did not believe that they should be made to leave their property if they did not want to. If you cannot evacuate from your home for one reason or another or wish not to, then you really need to be prepared to stay there for a long period of time until the flood waters recede and the area is cleaned back up.

This means that you need to be stocked up with plenty of food and even more bottled water than you think you might need for a week or two’s time. Depending on the number of people in the home, you will want to have more food and water saved up. Having one gallon of water put up for each person for every day you expect to be staying in the home and even more than that, since you never know exactly when you will be able to leave.

If you need to leave the home for any reason and the waters have receded, something you need to be aware of is downed power lines. These are extremely dangerous and you can never tell if the downed line is electrified or not. Never attempt to cross one of these, not even in a vehicle.

Whatever water damage was inflicted on your home needs to be recorded with a camcorder, if you can get your hands on one. You can show this to your insurance claims adjuster so that he or she knows just how much damage was done to your home and can give you a good idea of how much compensation you can expect from your insurance company.

After you have made a video of the damage, drying out your home is the next thing that you need to start doing. Wet items should be taken outside and left to dry, unless more rain is expected.

Open the doors and windows all around the home so that air from outside can blow through out the structure and start drying things out naturally. A wet vacuum can be used to help extract some of the water from under hardwood floors, but a regular vacuum cleaner should never be used to do this due to the risk of electrocution.

Jim Corkern is a writer and promoter of
Texas Water Damage Restoration and
Houston Water Damage Restoration Which are Certified IICRC Water damage and mold remediation contractors.