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Sink overflowed into ductwork

Admiral Tacoman

last year

I had a sink in a 1st floor bathroom that got clogged and overflowed for about an hour. I would guess about 10-20 gallons of water. Hard to say. Here's where it gets interesting.

There was a duct directly in front of the sink next to the vanity. The water did not pool, does not appear to have damaged any drywall or tile floor. Instead, it flowed down the sink, and directly, DIRECTLY into the ductwork. After some shopvac and towel work the bathroom LOOKS fine.

Now I go into the crawlspace. The duct was FULL of water. The ducts are RIGID ducts. They are drenched, inside and out. On instruction by my favorite HVAC guy, I cut the place in the duct where water pooled visibly and another 2-3 gallons poured out. The Crawl has like 3-4 gallons of pooled water in it, but I have a dehumidifier down there. I am not worried about Drying.

I AM worried about my subfloor (I have no insulation in the crawl and cannot see any visible damage), the wall behind the vanity (can't access it), vanity is against the wall but looks fine. But I am MOST worried about the ductwork. Full replace? Will it dry out? Should I submit a claim?

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Comments (3)

PRO
Joseph Corlett, LLC
last year
After you get the water out it will be fine.
ci_lantro
last year
Agree 100% with this guy^^.
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Admiral Tacoman
Original Author
last year
Ducts were good. Look dried out. Now we have two problems:

1. Insurance assigned "remediation" crew says there is still water showing under the marble flooring and the subfloor. I go up under the crawl and the wood reads 10%. But their moisture meter on top of the tile shows 90% (I can't believe that, it seems dry to the touch).

2. My vents, despite me taping them, are torn and tattered. They seem to have "burst" in certain places. There is a very faint odor of crawl space coming from the vents on the first floor now

:( I think we're in for some dough.

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