The Importance of Prompt Mold Damage Remediation in Bay Ridge

4/11/2023 (Permalink)

Ask SERVPRO about mold damage remediation for your Bay Ridge property. "Like it never even happened."

Knowing More About Mold Damage in Your House

As common as mold might be in everyday environments, many homeowners do not understand the risk of inaction. The growth and development of mold colonies in your household present a volatile environment that could impact your family and compromise the structural integrity of hosting materials. It is important to act fast when mold gets discovered in your residence.

Mold damage in Bay Ridge homes can develop in as little as a few days following water damage or flooding problems to your property. Rapid restoration of these disasters can prevent or mitigate mold infestations.

The Cause of Active Mold Growth

 You will not know how to save your house from mold when unsure of how it forms or the conditions necessary to promote colonization. Active growth requires moisture and warm temperatures. Other factors, like sunlight or lack thereof, are secondary. Varying types of residential molds can grow in different environments and conditions, but moisture and appropriate temperatures are universally necessary. Places like the basement, attic, and bathroom can experience moist conditions favorable to microbial development. If you are not frequently inspecting these spaces like the attic, mold growth can develop rapidly.

Should You Be Concerned About Mold?

It is vital to understand that mold in your home is nothing to ignore. We must treat this condition as any other disaster impacting your property and offer efficient and direct remediation and restoration solutions. The most alarming aspect of mold that homeowners should respect is the continuous spread of these organisms. This threat makes initial efforts like containment an important element of successful remediation for your residence.

Keeping Mold from Spreading

There are multiple ways to stop spores from relocating to other areas of your household. While physical barriers are the most direct method of preventing the movement of mold organisms, additional actions are necessary to prevent the use of other pathways like air ducts. We seal over vents and returns of the HVAC system to keep out mold spores. We also create negative pressure on these systems to drive out spores for collection by powerful HEPA vacuums.

The Remediation Process

Removing mold damage is a product of several approaches. We focus on the actions necessary to remove active colonies impacting housing materials at vastly different depths. Some remediation methods include:

• Surface Treatments

Using sporicidal and antimicrobial products, we can destroy surface mold colonies and create a buffer against repeat infestations.

• Hand Sanding

This technique is especially effective with wood framing and similar materials. Sanding removes the outermost layer of the material without compromising structural integrity.

• Abrasives

Media blasting can be an effective method of cleaning substrates hosting mold colonies. These efforts use pressurized air with abrasives like dry ice or baking soda to destroy mold without ruining the supporting material.

• Removing Damaged Materials

When all else fails, SERVPRO technicians can eliminate sensitive materials. Protecting your home sometimes demands direct demolition and safe disposal of mold-infested building elements.

Stopping Mold from Coming Back

We strive to do more than remove the mold threat to your home. We want to protect your property for the future by resolving where moisture found its way inside the structure. We have skilled professionals for repairs and reconstruction. This build-back and sealing can be even more effective with mold-resistant paint that helps stall microbial production in moist environments like bathrooms.

SERVPRO of Bay Ridge can help when mold damage threatens your home. We understand the urgency of these situations and have effective remediation solutions. Call us at (718) 765-5572.

Water Restoration Tasks You Should Anticipate at Your Bay Ridge Home

4/10/2023 (Permalink)

SERVPRO can rescue your flood damaged home in Bay Ridge with rapid water extraction and drying. "Like it never even happened."

Enlist SERVPRO for Your Bay Ridge Water Damage Management

The driving rain or rising groundwater characteristic of storms can leave your Bay Ridge property inundated. Such water accumulation creates several problems, which at the very least, diminish comfort or extreme cases, create hazards. If it's your first time handling water restoration, you may not know how challenging the process might become. However, a seasoned professional like SERVPRO readily understands the problem and thus can help you prepare well to tackle it.

Even if it is your first time handling water restoration at your Bay Ridge property, some of the necessary actions are not difficult to deduce. For example, you cannot leave water pooling on the floors within your property, so a response such as mopping the affected areas comes naturally. SERVPRO crews take the same steps, but we use superior techniques and equipment to improve the outcomes.

How we improve ordinary restoration actions

• Ensuring timely water extraction
• Cleaning all areas to sanitary levels
• Expediting and closely monitoring drying processes

When restoring a property, the speed of water removal is as essential as completeness because stagnation promotes microbial growth, which can lead to mold infestation. Such contamination can start in as little as 48 hours, so completing extraction and starting drying before this period elapses is essential. Our crews use vacuum extractors to fast-track water removal. We can also use specialized equipment such as drying mats which remove water-trapped breath tiles or wooden floorboards.

Unseen Issues Can Hamper Restoration

Storms can soil your property by depositing silt and mud inside. There are also invisible pollutants dissolved in the water, which might remain even physically eliminating the visible soils. The contaminants may be hazardous or emit unpleasant odors compromising indoor air quality.

Specialized tasks for complete restoration

• Decontamination
• Deodorization to eliminate
• Refinishing stained surfaces

SERVPRO of Bay Ridge ensures water restoration fixes all the problems that develop in a flooded property. You can reach us at (718) 765-5572. We’re Faster To Any Size Disaster.

Fire Damage in Bay Ridge Includes Tobacco Smoke to Kitchen Fires

3/14/2023 (Permalink)

Fire damage? SERVPRO is prepared with restoration equipment and experienced technicians.

We Protect Houses From the Effects of Fire Damage

Quitting smoking is a wonderful accomplishment, but doing so can make it clear how badly tobacco smoke can make the interior of your house in Bay Ridge stink. One of the worst pitfalls when learning to cook something new might be a yucky grease fire. Both are considered side effects of fire damage.

Many families in Bay Ridge trust SERVPRO's fire damage experts for cleanup and restoration. Long-term smoking inside results in the accumulation of tar from tobacco, and a grease fire is very similar, although it happens within a short period.

Our highly trained crew can handle freshening up your home after either, giving you and your family a clean, fresh, and beautiful start. Read on for explanations of how we clean tobacco tar and cooking grease accumulations from certain surfaces in local residences:

• Painted surfaces
• Porous wood
• Varnished wood

Painted surfaces can develop stains from greasy smoke, including that from ongoing smoking or a cooking accident. We remove deposited layers from painted surfaces using a wet cleaning method that includes our Wall and All Surface Cleaner (#351). These surfaces can include walls, ceilings, paneling, countertops, cabinetry, and shelving. Stained areas might require applying a sealer, followed by repainting.

Porous, unfinished wood is often found inside cabinetry, drawers, and attics. Several methods are used to clean by-products from fire or smoking in these areas. Because of their porous nature, they absorb particles more easily, making odor control very important to the results. We dilute the residues with alcohol, then apply SERVPRO's in-house Smoke Deodorizer (#302). During this time, we place anything from drawers and cabinets into bins so we can return everything correctly when we finish.

Cleaning varnished wood is similar to cleaning painted surfaces but also requires the application of conditioners to keep the wood underneath from drying out.

When you need a professional crew to help with damage from fire, call SERVPRO of Bay Ridge at (718) 765-5572.

Bay Ridge Homeowners Trust SERVPRO with Water Damage Repairs

2/6/2023 (Permalink)

SERVPRO's advanced LGR-low grain refrigerant dehumidifiers remove airborne moisture from Bay Ridge homes. Then we can repair them when needed.

Water Damage Restoration in Bay Ridge—Call SERVPRO

Water damage to your Bay Ridge home can cause lasting structural damage if not handled promptly. Professionals like SERVPRO have the knowledge, training, and tools to ensure that the water does not cause irreparable harm to your home. We use state-of-the-art technology to restore your home to its preloss condition as quickly as possible.

SERVPRO techs use scientific principles to manipulate the drying conditions to accelerate drying while restoring water damage to your Bay Ridge home. Our IICRC-certified experts create ideal drying conditions by controlling various physical properties of the air, such as temperature, moisture content, and velocity.

The Role of Psychrometry in Water Restoration

Psychrometry is the study of air and its properties. Restorers measure the various properties of the drying air, like temperature, humidity, vapor pressure, and dew point, to evaluate whether the conditions are favorable for drying. If not, the restorers manipulate these conditions so that water evaporates more readily from the surfaces. 

• Temperature plays an important role in speeding up the rate of evaporation. Warmer air can accommodate more moisture and dry a surface faster than cooler air.
• Humidity is the volume of water in the vapor form in the air. The more moisture the air carries, the less efficient it is for drying. SERVPRO techs use dehumidifiers to remove excess moisture from the air and to make conditions ideal for drying.
• Vapor pressure is the pressure that water vapor exerts on surrounding surfaces. Wetter air has higher vapor pressure, forcing moisture into the surface rather than out of the surface. Reducing it results in an acceleration of the rate of drying.

Combining Techniques

Rather than relying on a single drying technique, SERVPRO techs use a combination of methods using strategically placed dehumidifiers, heaters, and air movers to ensure that your water-damaged home dries as quickly as possible. "Like it never even happened."

Call SERVPRO of Bay Ridge at (718) 765-5572 today.