My fire/water safe got moldy - how do I clean it?

March 31, 2006 7:45 AM

How do I clean a moldy fire/water safe and the contents?

I put some paper documents (receipts, passports)in a fire/water safe along with some DVD-Rs of computer backups. As near as I can tell, the ink from the sharpies used to write on the discs has bloomed, and now everything in the safe is covered with a fine white mold/mildew and it smells musty.

Obviously, I should have probably not put the discs in there, or used a dessicant of some kind. (Yes, I know about the temperature limitations of consumer fire safes with respect to optical media - I was mostly concerned about theft and possible floods, as there have been some pipe leaks in the building.)

I cleaned off the passports with rubbing alcohol, and put them in a ziploc bag with a dessicant pack left over from some photo stuff.

I assume the DVD-Rs are hosed and I should just toss them and make new ones. What else should I be doing to clean this up? The paper receipts are slightly damp, but seem otherwise okay. However, I assume that soaking them in rubbing alcohol will destroy them. How do I kill whatever is living on them without doing that?

What should I use to clean the inside of the safe?

For future reference - what's the right kind of dessicant to use inside the safe?

posted by Caviar to grab bag (3 comments total)

I went through a house flood a few years ago, so I think I can offer some good advice.

Anything paper can probably be safely air dried in the sun. Mold hates driect UV light, so spread them our somewhere that gets lots of light. Watch out for fading though. Don't leave them out for weeks or anything.

As far as cleaning the safe, hot water with a bit of bleach. Hope the contents of the safe are your biggest problem. Flooding sucks.
posted by cosmicbandito at 9:02 AM on March 31, 2006

To be clear - there was no flood, and this was a precautionary measure.

The mold has been growing just inside the safe, which has not gotten wet. I assume it's from the liquid in the ink trapped inside the safe.
posted by Caviar at 9:04 AM on March 31, 2006

Camphor cakes, while they won't undo the humidity, will kill the mold and prevent its return. You can buy them at many pharmacies (you may have to ask at the desk). Just strip off the cellophane from about 1/8 of the cake and put it in the closed safe, or put a small piece in a sealed bag with stuff you want to decontaminate or protect. Replace when fully gone. The odor airs out of the papers fairly quickly once they are out in the open air. Don't let it sit on disks or other plastics, though--it does damage some in direct contact although we never had any problems with plastics and the vapors (and stored some stuff in sealed plastic bags with camphor for over a decade). It should be okay with stuff like passports, too--it's used by many wool shops to store stock without mildewing or getting moth-eaten.

If little bags of silicon beads aren't up to the moisture, you might try some of the clay-like stuff you can buy in grocery stores in the humid south (sorry, can't remember brand names) that looks like cat litter and attracts moisture. It comes in a plastic container, rather like a cottage cheese tub or similar. Water will collect in the bottom, so putting it where it won't spill and changing it out or emptying it is required. But it works.

Really, though, with the camphor we've found that our safe can stay that bit of damp without things getting into trouble.

For cleaning the existing mold off of washables, try Pine Sol. It's not as messy or destructive as chlorine bleach and used full strength and then rinsed is every bit as deadly. In years of using it on our boat, I've never found that it's damaged plastics or wood finishes or paints.
posted by salt at 12:06 PM on March 31, 2006