Water Heater flooded basement.

So wake up to no hot water. Go into basement. Rushing water from the center flue stack or whatever of the hot water heater. Killed the water. Utility room is bare concrete with a drain that doesnt seem to hardly drain for shit, was a little clogged with lint from A/C line I never saw since the pipe obscured.

So In surrounding area I've got some painted walls that are showing bunching/wrinkling of the paint, then the carpet on other side of walls are a swamp. Oh and as I type this I guess I should turn off the gas, though letting it heat whats in there might be nice for one last shower before starting to deal with this shit.



Freak out restoration company or should I just start with wet vac and a carpet shampoo-er to sop up the carpets? Going to shop for a new water heater I guess, will Home depot etc delivery usually offer haul away? Things going to be heavy I'm guessing even if I'm able to drain it?

Doesn't help fairly high humidity in area from my aquarium sump in the next room.

Should I space heater the room for warmth and the fans. Or am I better off despite the cold opening basement windows w/ fans to allow the cold but dry outside air in/out?

Or at least love to the water heater etc....

This happened overnight while sleeping though. Other than replacing it before failure not much i think ii coul have done. Draining it pretty clean so not like it was a ton of sediment build up.

I hate this house because it's a half basement. So I feel cramped in it. It's one fairly good sized I guess bedroom with a almost pantry very shallow but wide closet and crawlspace entrance. Tiny hallwall from stairs to this room, the utility closet w/ the ac/heater/water heater. A bathroom which was very nicely done at least. Then a door to a ... dunno half bedroom sized unfinished area which is taken up entirely by the 125g sump and related stuff for my massive saltwater aquarium above it and the dog run since the bitches destroy smaller crates.

Mixed bag so far. Dry wall paint on one side has a couple shallow bubbles and a crinkle/run. Seems to be drying out ok with a fan blasting it. Was only a single panel that was getting water splashing from the top of the water heater, rather than wicking it up from a pool on floor. Theres a micro closet under the stairs with untacked/padded carpet (but attached to the main run so I cant remove easily) that sucks since it like curves under into a little 2 foot high area, so I've got a fan tucked back there. Fish room is used to getting some floods and is whatever. The bedroom (for us just storage and some excersize stuff) however.

I'm torn on how bad it is. Wall seems fine since it was floating. Carpet is mighty heavy when I pulled it up from half the room. Unsure how much water vs just carpet, seemed actually fairly dry (still damp) after the rug dr for a few hours followed by stanley steemer pass over my wife ordered while I was still stuck at work. I'd pull carpet from whole room and hallway but it seems to be all one piece? Quickly becomes unworkable in size/bulk/weight. The pad doesnt feel sopping wet but I get visible water if I pinch.



Thinking I might try to run the steam vac sucking over it for more water? I'd just tear the pad all up except the issue of challenging to get the whole floor cleared and up due to one piece? Needing help to get 2 mattresses and some other bulky stuff up the stairs since theres already no room in basement and main floor has a fair amount of stuff already. Aside from 3-4 good sized house fans, I went and got the home depot top down carpet blower, one of the snail drum blowers, and the uber 29g dehumidifier. I was trying to cycle ac/heat and now thinking just heat + dehumidifier doing it's thing. I'm going to actually try rolling pin testing the pad to see how much water moves when I do that. Might spend an hour or so trying to push the water our to the sides, run the vac over it, then go ahead and drop the carpet down with the snail running underneath it, the top down out in the hallway carpet and pray from there.

And if anyone curious, heres what a local hobby forum guy who owns multiple props and did some restoration I guess said. And he's spoken on lots of home reno/build stuff before......."

Extract the carpet, rent a rug doctor. Roll it back and trash the pad. Put carpet fans under the carpet so it billows. This will also dry the cement. Rent at least 2 dehumidifiers. Any walls that are completely soaked cut a hole in them low and high and put a carpet fan on the lower hole. Turn the heat up and run your a/c. If you can't do both at once cycle back and forth. If you have vinyl just strip it out, ceramic should be ok.

You can check sheet rock with a moisture sensor which is actually a continuity tester so if you have that setting on a multimeter you can skip buying it.

You have 72 hours from first water before mold sets in to get it completely dry. Don't skip steps, if it seems daunting claim insurance and get a restoration company in today before they get busy

Forgot to mention pull all baseboard from the effected areas. If you have a free floating slab you can skip cutting holes into the stud cavity. If you pull the baseboard and there's a gap between the slab and the lowest 2x4 you have free floating.

If not every other stud cavity should be ventilated in a saturated wall. There's special equipment for that but I'm not sure what you can actually get a hold of.

"""


Some didnt apply since I have only one little area of drywall wet and floating wall.

My favorite house was a rental. GF now wife hated it, but I think she couldnt seperate hating my coworker and the town (she managed to start shit w/ some locals) But to me it was perfect. Kitchen opening to garage, spacious living room with a short wall seperating open air straight shot stairs. (Vs all these fucking tight corner stairs most have here that is hard to move anything big down). Full unfinished basement, besides my massive aquariums was storage. Had water spills and just did like you said. Created a computer desk area, couch, big screen on area rug away from the tanks. Was perfect.

Besides the open living room, had a kinda odd room set aside by some french doors, but otherwise far end of house was just a short zig zag hallway leading to bed/bathrooms all on that side of the house.




I was going to make a thread but I'll day dream here. With houses going from like 200, to 250 by the time we bought and now selling for 370. I was kinda hoping this year to try and take that equity find some land a few miles of the way in bum fuck nowhere ~1hour from work. And build a new single story + basement, maybe a nicer system built home, or kinda became enamored with these garage homes. Basically steel structure partitioned off into home/garage. Had hoped might get something basic done for 300 and pocket 100k for retirement, but I think even in the sticks in Colorado prices are going up as bad as in town. I'd love to leave for Utah/Idaho etc but she has nieces as surragate kids since we wont have any.

Ya, was a rough example and far more grandoise in size to what I'd try. Ideally I'd want single floor everything, but wife is in love with 2 story, and does keep square footage down I guess.