Guest Post: What Happens To Your Wine Cellar During a Flood?

Every winter we glue ourselves to the news during ‘Storm Watch’ because of the unpredictable nature of the weather around the country. Wind, rain, hail, and snow can cause horrific damage to your home. Aside from weather considerations, even problems with the pipes in your home can do equal damage to your belongings. There are a few things that you should consider if your wine cellar is damaged or flooded by circumstances beyond your control.

View the damage to your wine cellar and figure out what was affected the most. Consult your insurance company for advice. Was your wine cellar covered? Check out your policy for information and have a chat with your local representative.

Wine Bottles

Were specific bottles of wine submerged in water? Remember that flood waters are just not regular water. They can often by contaminated with chemicals, sewage, oil, and other unfavorable things. If your bottles were submerged, then you need to consider how the bottles were secured. Does your wine have screw tops or corks? With a high alcohol content, wine should be relatively safe with screw tops. Another consideration would be the contaminated water affecting the labels and necks of the screw caps. When you pour the wine later, will you be affecting the wine with contamination?

Wood Wine Racks

What type of wood wine racks are installed in your wine cellar? There are several types of woods, like Redwood, that come from cool, damp forests in California and are naturally resistant to humid atmosphere, rot, mildew, and decay which can save you when a flood comes through.

Many reclamation projects are in Northern California pulling out sunken Redwood logs from rivers. When these logs are recovered, the wood is in perfect condition due to its resilient nature and is taken straight to the mill to be cut down. If your home floods having Redwood is a great choice for your wine cellar racks.

Refrigeration Cooling Unit

One of the most important aspects would be your wine cellar cooling unit. Call an HVAC professional in to look at the compressor, evaporator, and fans if it has been damaged.  The Air Conditioning, Heating and Refrigeration Institute recommended after Hurricane Sandy that all units damaged should be replaced, not repaired. The equipment has small valves, gears, and controls that are very sensitive and the damage might not be visible. Additionally, if your refrigeration unit has ductwork, a professional contractor would want to replace it because it would be impossible to decontaminate.

Flood damage of any kind can be extremely traumatic. Be prepared and make sure you have all your purchase agreements, warranties, and contact information in a handy place. Find the silver lining in that cloud and upgrade your systems to try and prevent future catastrophes from happening.

Guest Post: Kristi Davis is the Interactive Marketing Manager for Wine Cellar Innovations. Her favorite part of her job is seeing home owners dreams come true in the beautiful wine rooms they create. Follow them on Twitter, Facebook, and their wine cellar blog.