Watching the water rise in your kitchen sink literally gives you that “sinking feeling”. That’s what can happen when there’s a blockage in the drain and water has no where to go but into your kitchen.
I live in a ground floor apartment and my upstairs neighbors' dishwasher and washer drain into a common pipe that services both our units. Once, when the water began to back up into my sink, I ran upstairs but my neighbor, for some reason, did not answer my frantic knocking on their door and yelling. The water in the sink rose up and over the counter into my kitchen drawers, onto my kitchen and dining room floors, and soaking my area rugs downstream!
I eventually bought a wet vac which has come in very useful during several reoccurrences over the years.
Emptying a flooded sink is a bit like bailing out a sinking boat. If you’re a homeowner, you’ll need to call a plumber who will snake the pipes to clear the blockage. If you rent your apartment, call your landlord for assistance. If you don’t have a plumber, you can call Charlie’s Plumbing at 713-941-3162 and they’ll send a plumber to your location day or night. From my experience, it will happen in the evening on a holiday weekend.
I know that these things can happen in a community like ours because the pipes are old and they have a tendency to narrow at certain points when stuff like oil and coffee grounds are sent down our kitchen drains.
Here are 6 thinks you should NEVER put down the kitchen sink:
- Grease, cooking oil, and animal fat (which will harden and build up in the pipes)
- Coffee grinds
- Fruit and vegetable peels
- Egg shells
- Soft foods that enlarge with water (pasta, beans, potatoes, rice, etc)
- Small seeds and grains which will also enlarge with water (corn kernels, cherry pits, chia seeds)
You may have a garbage disposal, but using it to shred anything in the list above does not help the eventual problems like a sink backup. In fact, the best thing to have in your kitchen drain is a removable fine mesh strainer that costs less than $5 which collects all the food debris from rinsing your dishes and cleaning your pots and pans. Once its full, you can empty the strainer into a garbage bag.
If you’re disposing of liquid fat, let the grease cool and pour into an old mason jar or coffee can and toss in the trash. If you don't want to waste an old container, place it in a bowl or other container, freeze or let harden in the fridge, and then scoop out the grease into a plastic bag (double bagging is a good idea) and toss in the trash.
Or, if you’re really eco-conscience, dispose of the fat at the Houston Environmental Services Center on South Post Oak. (Google Map).