Flooded apartment? ?

Question

I broke the water supply thing for our toilet and flooded my whole apartment with rusty saltwater. There was about two inches of water that we were able to vacume out and i've mopped over the apartment with freshwater. I'm very busy right now so i don't have much time to sort things out but when i do is there anything i need to be aware of and things i need to check when cleaning and sorting out a flooded house?

Answer 1

Your toilet uses saltwater to flush?  That's odd...  I hope it doesn't flush the contents out into open water, too!

Normally, I would worry about mildew.  I don't know if it will grow when the carpets or rugs are wet with saltwater, though.  

When I had a waterbed leak awhile ago, I rented a carpet cleaner, like a Rug Doctor brand carpet cleaner, and used that to vacuum the carpet and pull out water.  You should use a strong solution of the carpet cleaner shampoo to help kill any mildew, and then go over it several times again with clean water in the tank.  This should get rid of the sticky feeling, also.

After this, I pulled the carpet loose in the room, one half at a time, and put sawhorses under it to get it off the floor, and put a fan in the room to circulate air and get it dry.  Once that side dried, I put the carpet back down on that end, and lifted the other end, and put the fans in so that they circulated under the carpet.  It worked fine - everything was clean and dry afterwards.  If you need one, you can rent a carpet stretcher to help put the carpets back down.

If this was my responsibility, I would find time to do this just as soon as possible.  If mildew starts growing there, it will be hard to stop it later, and you'll have the smell, and maybe be charged for damage, too.