The contents pros have cleaned soot and smoke from flat painted walls, from tricky gloss walls, from brick and even textured wall paper, but few surfaces are more challenging than unfinished wood. Every splinter, every nook and cranny can be filled with smoke particulates. So when one company was faced with a whole house full of magnificent wood walls, ceilings and floors they had to get really creative.
In R & R Magazine the adjuster on the case said, “The cleaning of the house and restoration of the fire damage took less than four months and was approximately $45,000 less than what I had originally quoted.”
How did they do it? Well they “gutted” the basement (where the fire had started) and soda-blasted all the surfaces. Then they “washed” all surfaces (including 26 ft. high walls) with a special solution and power sprayers. The runoff was collected in a basin and the waste was pumped outdoors.
The adjuster added, “The insured and his wife were pleased with the complete restoration of the home and removal of the entire smoke odor.”
What many had considered to be a crazy scheme, proved to be just another in a long line of innovations by the contents professionals. And really, the job was so massive, the lines were blurred between contents and structural pros – this time they were one and the same!
In Our Own Backyard: Cleaning Schools After the Thomas Fire in Southern California
