Fire Damage Restoration Grand Junction
1-800 Water Damage is known for fire damage restoration in Grand Junction and surrounding areas. We regularly blog about things like smoke damage repair and fire damage restoration. We helped put on the 2018 Western Colorado Fire Summit where we educated insurance professionals and fire investigators by partnering with a local forensic engineering firm and fire fighters to burn down a car and two small buildings. We have the only (as of the time of this writing) master-certified fire damage restoration technicians in the entire Western slope of Colorado. And finally, through our partner company Packoutz of Western Colorado, we have the best technology and capability in Grand Junction and the Western slope for contents cleaning and smoke damage repair.
Fire Damage Restoration Might Be More Common Than You Think
The sad part is that fires happen in peoples’ homes every day, all over the country. Even in Grand Junction, we see fires happen all the time. From small stove-top fires to large electrical fires, peoples’ lives are negatively impacted – hugely impacted – by these disasters. Fire damage restoration from quality restoration contractors is in huge demand.
2018 saw numerous fires in Colorado. Wildfires burned over 400,000 acres of land. The 416 fire near Durango was one of the very worst to ever hit the area. The skies over Grand Junction, CO were covered with ash and soot for nearly two months from both Colorado and California fires. We probably all remember breathing in smoke every day just driving across town or heading to work. Some of the folks at Delta were even wearing respirators on some of the worse days, to keep healthy. Even this year, we’re seeing a number of large-scale forest fires break out around us.
The city of Grand Junction and surrounding areas also had dozens of home and business fires every year. 1-800 Water Damage of Western Colorado works with the Grand Junction Fire Department, and is on their preferred vendor list for home and property board-ups. When fire or smoke damage blows out windows or burns through doors or other building structures, we show up to board up those entryways. We then often work with home and building owners to restore their property once everything has gone through insurance and inspections.
With Fire Damage Restoration, Our Homes Are Toxic
Few people realize just how toxic an indoor environment becomes after even the smallest fire. Homes are filled with plastics, chemicals, and potentially other harmful material like asbestos. When a fire starts, all those materials begin to melt, burn, vaporize, or otherwise release into the rest of the house.
We once responded to a fire damage restoration job in an office building. The fire had started sometime late at night when no one was around. Luckily, the fire department arrived quickly enough to keep the whole building from catching ablaze, but we found out early in the restoration process that the building contained asbestos. Asbestos had contaminated the entire office space, and before any kind of restoration work could be done, abatement had to be completed.
Grand Junction is filled with older buildings, constructed in the 1970’s or earlier, so asbestos is common. Even in building that don’t contain asbestos, however, all our homes have cleaning supplies hidden in some closet or cabinet. We all have plastics of some kind or another. When those materials heat up enough, they vaporize, and contaminate air quality. Whenever our techs enter a home to restore fire or smoke damage, they’re always wearing personal protective equipment. They wear not only a respirator, but a full-face mask and hood to protect their eyes and ears, along with their nose and mouth. They treat a fire-damaged home like it’s the worst kind of environment they could possibly enter. And even with their equipment, they often leave smoke-damaged sites with black goop dripping out of the ends of their noses.
Not All Fire Damage Restoration Contractors in Grand Junction Are Equally Trained
Most restoration contractors in Grand Junction have minimal training on how to handle fire damage restoration. Not that they can’t complete the job – they can. But fire damage restoration is a huge area of study, and it’s not easy to master the restoration process. The reason 1-800 Water Damage works so closely with the Grand Junction fire department is because our teams continually educate and train one another. Their job is to put out fires and investigate its causes, while ours is to restore the property after the fire’s been put out.
Together, we put on the 2018 Western Colorado Fire Summit so that we could all get training from structural and forensic engineers on the mechanics of how fires work and evolve through a burn. We also had about twenty-five insurance agents and adjusters from around Grand Junction join us at the event. The insurance agents in attendance also wanted a better understanding of the work involved for putting out fires, and the restoration process, and they wanted to be of more support to their clients in the case of a fire in their home. That fire summit continues to be a key piece of our ongoing support of the fire department and city of Grand Junction each year.
Expertise
The main difference between the many fire damage restoration contractors in Grand Junction is the level of expertise. As mentioned before, if a company is involved in the disaster cleanup industry and they say they’re capable of handling fire losses, they probably are. But just because a company can perform the work doesn’t mean they should be the first choice for anyone looking for contractors for their own home, or for their clients.
Every material in a home is cleaned just a tad differently when it comes to fire and smoke damage. Our team approaches every material in the way it is most properly cleaned, which allows us to salvage a high percentage of the contents of a home, at a better price. Other companies who lack that kind of specialized knowledge often resort to a “one-size-fits-all” cleaning approach, with often mixed or minor results. The job ultimately gets done with those other companies, but their lack of training makes it difficult to get stellar results. Many times, using companies with less training results in more contents of a home being thrown out, as opposed to saved and restored (at a much lower price).
Hire Us
When it comes to Grand Junction, there really is only one company that can claim to be fire damage restoration experts. The only company on the Western Slope who have master-certified fire damage restorers: 1-800 Water Damage of Western Colorado.