Shitty situation.

May 16, 2010 9:07 AM

Last night, at the restaurant I help manage, a drain pipe clogged. Raw sewage flooded the back rooms, bathrooms, kitchen, and half of the seating area of the first floor of the restaurant. What now?

I am posting this because unfortunately on a Sunday there is no one I can think of that I can get on a line to get an official word out of the health department. I'm very concerned because to me, this is a bio-hazard situation and it makes me very uncomfortable to think of kids or anyone coming in the restaurant until this has been dealt with properly.

The owners are naturally concerned about loss of revenue, but also want to make sure we are legally covered and morally covered.

To hold us over until tomorrow when we can talk to the Health Dept. I'm wondering if anyone has experience in this situation. What kind of cleaning needs to be done? Carpets replaced? Do we need to get re-inspected post cleaning and before re-opening? Any other anecdotes would be lovely. This is in North Carolina, USA, if it helps with regards to changing statutes from place to place.

posted by anonymous to Work & Money (14 answers total)

[In the UK] I once ripped the kitchen out of a restaurant where a similar thing had happened. Put simply, the entire equipment was considered unsanitary.

There are two organisations you need to speak to: your Health Dept and your insurers. I wouldn't do anything - and that certainly includes reopening - until the former have told you what needs to get cleaned or replaced and the latter tells you what they'll pay for.
posted by MuffinMan at 9:16 AM on May 16, 2010

Call Servpro, or their nearest competitor; they usually have 24-hour emergency lines, and cleaning up this sort of damage is what they know how to do. We had a broken water main at work on a Saturday morning; the watermain broke outside, and due to poor construction the pressure forced a mix of water and mud into the building. The Servpro guys where there later the same day; they even did things like cut away wet/stained drywall and treated the wood underneath to avoid future mold/fungus problems that we wouldn't have thought of if we simply mopped up and threw out the carpet.
posted by AzraelBrown at 9:17 AM on May 16, 2010 [2 favorites]

2nding Servpro. Another vendor in the field is ServiceMaster, and they too offer a 24-hour response line.
posted by jquinby at 9:51 AM on May 16, 2010

Call your insurance company first and foremost. If you do anything that makes it harder to collect, this will be an ever loving nightmare.
posted by KathrynT at 9:53 AM on May 16, 2010

First call your insurer.
Second call Servpro.
Third call the health department.
Fourth call your plumber.
Fifth call your cleaning crew.
Sixth call your employees.
Seventh call that bottle of scotch you hid in the manager's office. You'll need it.

I've been through a similar disaster and it kept us closed for a week. My sympathies.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 9:57 AM on May 16, 2010 [8 favorites]

Our health department has a 24 hour hotline which I would call in this situation. You can call 911 and ask if there is such a thing in your area. Then stick out the "temporarily closed" sign. The owners (not you the manager) should then call their insurance and figure out who to call next (ie: plumber, cleaners, employees, etc).
posted by MsKim at 10:06 AM on May 16, 2010

I would NOT suggest calling 911. Unless this is truly a life and death emergency. Does your city/town have a non-emergency help line (ie. 311)? You might be able to contact the health department that way.
posted by nimsey lou at 11:18 AM on May 16, 2010 [1 favorite]

Your insurer should be available on a Sunday, even if the health department is not. They're the first people to call, before you do anything, so that you're sure everything you do will be covered.
posted by palliser at 12:50 PM on May 16, 2010

I'm very concerned because to me, this is a bio-hazard situation and it makes me very uncomfortable to think of kids or anyone coming in the restaurant until this has been dealt with properly.

Sorry if I'm mis-reading, but this makes me wonder if someone in charge thinks it might be okay to re-open before talking to the health department tomorrow...? It's definitely a bio-hazard situation -- raw sewage carries hepatitis and all kinds of other nasties. Re-opening might cause injury, and it might also void the restaurant's insurance.
posted by palliser at 12:55 PM on May 16, 2010

The insurance company should not be the first call. The owners of the restaurant should be the first call. They are the ones who make these decisions. Unless your restaurant is unlike any I have ever come across, these things are "above the pay grade" of a manager.

Where I worked, it would have gone like this:

Shut the restaurant down.
Call the plumber.
Plumber fixes it, tells you how to clean it up.
Clean it up.
Throw away any mops/brooms/towels used in the cleanup.
Throw away any stock that was contaminated.
Sanitize the walls/floor/everything.
Wash and sanitize the dishes.
Reopen.
posted by gjc at 3:16 PM on May 16, 2010

I forgot my point: you don't need the insurance company or the health department for these things. Neither of them can certify the restaurant poop-free. All you can do is clean it up and "re-boot" the food safety controls. If you are using NSF equipment and the restaurant passed an inspection when it opened or was last remodeled, that means that everything that's not disposable is cleanable. Clean it the way you learned in food service sanitation class and the restaurant will be safe to operate.
posted by gjc at 3:22 PM on May 16, 2010

a friend of mine once worked for an industrial cleaning company when the same thing happened at a WaWa (deli/convenience store). they had to throw out EVERYTHING in the store. it was all considered to be "contaminated." shelf stock, back stock, everything. basically if it wasn't bolted down it hit the dumpster.
posted by swbarrett at 3:56 PM on May 16, 2010

I used to work for a nightclub where this happened on a regular basis, as in at least once a month. Our procedure for dealing with it was identical to what gjc is recommending except with gloves, gumboots and a face mask on everyone involved (you DON'T want it in your eyes and mouth).

We never used to close while these floods were happening. Being a club, it was dark and our customers were usually too drunk to notice that they were slipping and sliding around on human shit and piss - not that it wasn't their fault for putting underwear/broken glass/entire rolls of paper in the toilet anyway.
posted by Wantok at 6:17 PM on May 16, 2010

My father has owned and managed a plumbing company for many years, and he recommends using Servpro for the after-effects (as other people have mentioned). You can file insurance later and see if it goes through (it should), but there is no sense waiting around because more problems will arise if this is not dealt with quickly.

Health Department seems useless to call until after you've dealt with things. Get it re-inspected if you're concerned, but this happens in restaurants all the time.
posted by Outis at 7:55 AM on May 17, 2010