The Ronald McDonald House in Columbia, Missouri has had to shut its doors temporarily while waterdamage in the center’s basement is remediated. The Ronald McDonald House Charities provide support to families who need a home away from home while their children receive treatment at nearby hospitals.
When Water Damage Hurts More than Just the Business
The water damage occurred at the Columbia Ronald McDonald house after flooding due to heavy rains caused the sump pump in the basement to overflow. “The Columbia Daily Tribune” reports the basement served as a common area where visiting families would congregate, have access to computers and do their laundry. Offices and storage areas are also located in the basement of the facility. This particular Ronald McDonald House can house up to 14 families.
Hospital social workers are working with the families who do not have the means to pay for a hotel, but need accommodations. In the meantime, restoration crews and community volunteers are working hard to repair the water damage quickly so the Ronald McDonald House can continue to support families attending to the needs of their hospitalized children.
A recent fire has closed down the Madison Children’s Museum in Wisconsin until August 14, 2010. The cause of the downtown Madison museum’s closure is not due so much to the fire damage the building experienced. Rather, it is because of the following water damage.
The Good, the Bad and the Wet
A fire broke out at the museum in the early hours of the morning recently, triggering the newly installed sprinkler system. When firefighters arrived on the scene, they found a flood of water running down the rear stairs of the building. The fire originally started in the break room after a coffee maker, which was plugged into an electrical outlet, overheated and caught fire. The sprinkler systems did their job and extinguished the blaze before it could spread throughout the museum. However, the same is not true of the water, which ran down four flights of stairs. The fire damage totaled $5,000; the water damage was $45,000. However, the cost of the fire damage could have been higher if the sprinkler system did not work.
When it comes to business continuity, could your business survive being closed for a couple of weeks or more because of water or fire damage? Talk to a restoration professional today to see how you can plan to prevent such a disaster, and how to get back on your feet quickly when the unthinkable happens.
An unusually cooler summer in the Pacific Northwest has given firefighting crews some relief this year. Oil-rich pine trees along with grasses and brush in dry, hot summer heat are the perfect fuel for wildfires, which have engulfed several thousands of acres during the past summer seasons.
According to news station KGW, the peak of wildfire season is July 1 through August 20. This year, however, the cold, wet June weather pushed the wildfire season back three weeks. The cooler weather has kept grasses and brush greener, so even multiple lightening strikes are not producing large-scale fires. So far, for example, only two wildfires have affected the state of Oregon this summer.
While this news is can help residents put their fears aside, they should not relax when it comes to taking wildfire precautionary measures. After all, there are still several weeks remaining in the wildfire season.
Take the following steps to help protect your home and business for a wildfire:
Remove all pine needles that have fallen on the ground around a building. Additionally, do not lay pine needles down as a form of mulch or a decorative landscape element. Pine needles, even dry ones, contain oil in them that can easily ignite.
Clear the area around a building of any dry brush, and move flammable vegetation at least 30 feet away from a building.
If you like the look of vegetation around a building, consider planting succulents. These easy-to-manage plants are rich in color and moisture—even during dry, hot weather—and can help act as a fire barrier.
Keep all combustible materials, such as gas tanks and flammable chemicals, away from a building.
Keep your landscape well manicured. Well-watered lawns and trimmed hedges are harder for fires to penetrate.
Flooding, extending from the Midwestern states to the east coast of the U.S., has caused unforeseen devastation and cleanup costs. States affected by floodwaters include Iowa, Delaware, Virginia, Kentucky, Maryland, Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and more. The causes of the floods are due to severe thunderstorms in the north and along the Atlantic Coast that filled rivers and lakes, and Tropical Depression Bonnie, which brewed in the Gulf of Mexico, according to Reuters.
Clean-Up Tips
Now that the storms are gone, residents in the flood-damaged states are left to clean the devastation in extreme heat. To those cleaning up after the aftermath of the natural disasters, consider the following tips:
Take pictures of all the damage to your property and write notes about it on a piece of paper. When individuals are stressed-out important information can easily slip their memory, and this type of documentation is helpful when making a claim with an insurance company or are seeking remediation assistance.
Use water cautiously. While water from wells may be okay for bathing in, only drink bottled water or water you boiled.
Start cleaning flood-damaged items as soon as you know it is safe to do so. Heat and moisture are the perfect breeding grounds for mold. Mold can grow in as little as three days, so it is to one’s advantage to act quickly, especially when it comes to wet documents, wet books and photographs. This is something business owners need to act quickly on so they can get back in business ASAP.
See if FEMA has declared a disaster in your area. Checkout their mobile site, m.fema.gov, and apply for disaster aid on your Smartphone.
Call in the experts. The assistance of a disaster restoration company can help you make sure your wet items are completely dry and mold-free so you do not have reoccurring mold problems and damage in the future.
While storms are scary and the aftermath is stressful, you have the power get your life back to normal quickly when you clean the water damage correctly. Learn more about what to do after a flood.
A leak that began on June 4, 2010 from a damaged pipe in Central Michigan University’s Brooks Hall will cost the educational institution $975,000 to repair. According to “Central Michigan Life,” up to 50 gallons of water, the equivalent of a medium-sized swimming pool, started on the third floor and damaged 90 rooms in the building.
David Burdette, the university’s vice president of Finance and Administrative Services, stated that the drywall, ceiling tiles, carpet, insulation and the electrical wiring in the Brooks Hall all suffered water damage and need repairs. “Central Michigan Life” states, “The wall next to the leaking pipe was completely damaged.”
Brooks Hall was renovated in 2008, and it is speculated that mistakes were made during the facelift, but the university is not publicly pointing fingers. Central Michigan University has hired a professional cleaning and restoration service to clean the building and aid in business continuityin an attempt to have the building ready for fall classes, which start on August 23, 2010.
When a place of business has a leak, it is vital that repairs be done right away. The more time water has to flow and soak into a building, the worse the water damage and mold gets, especially on items such as wet documents and wet books.
