If a sewer line becomes obstructed, wastewater will no longer be able to pass through and drain from your home. When this happens, a sewage backup can occur, causing wastewater to fill the sewer line and drain back into your home. This can pose a severe danger to you and your family as well as potentially cause severe damage to your home. Fortunately, there are steps you can take now to mitigate the risk of a sewage backup.
The Reasons Sewage Backs Up
There are a few primary causes of the majority of sewage backups. These include:
- Clogging: When items other than toilet paper end up in your toilet, including trash, hair, or cooking grease, it often will become trapped and incapable of passing through. If enough builds up, it can completely clog your home's main sewage line.
- Tree Roots: Tree roots can grow in or around your main sewer line. When tree roots grow around the line, they can gradually distort or crush the line causing restrictions. Tree roots can grow into the line itself, seeking the rich nutrients within, causing holes, and eventually blocking the line completely.
- Heavy Rainfall: When heavy rainfall occurs, city sewer lines may become overburdened by the excess water that makes its way inside. This can result in sewage backflows.
- Busted Sewage Line: Sewage lines, particularly older pipes made of iron or clay, can break, causing sewage to back up. This is less likely with modern sewage lines, which are constructed out of plastic materials.
How to Prevent a Sewage Backup
There are several steps you can take to reduce the risk of a sewage backup. These include:
- Never pour grease down a drain. You should never dispose of grease in a drain. This grease can harden and clog pipes, which will eventually cause wastewater to stop draining. The best way to dispose of cooking grease or fat is to wait for it to cool off and dispose of it in your trash container.
- Never dispose of garbage in your toilet. Garbage, including feminine products, diapers, or wet wipes, should never be disposed of in your toilet. This can clog sewer lines leading to a backup.
- Replace old sewer lines with plastic pipes. Installing plastic lines serves a dual purpose. This will ensure that your home has a new, more durable sewer line that will last for many years to come. Plus, it will be more resistant to tree roots and give you an opportunity to trim any tree roots that have grown too close to the line buried underneath your lawn.
- Set up a backwater prevention valve. A backwater prevention valve is a device that only allows sewage to flow one way. This is installed either in the sewer line or a drain line inside your basement.
Final Thoughts
Sewage backups can cause a lot of damage, and the danger raw sewage presents can pose a serious health risk. It is important to ensure that your home is protected from a risk of a sewage backup before one occurs.
Contact Us
If your home suffers from a sewage backup, it is important to act quickly and contact Restore Pro. Our restoration professionals have more than two decades of experience helping home, and business owners restore property damaged by flooding and sewage backups. Call us at 1-800-847-0114 and connect with us on Facebook.