There are few electrical safety tips everybody shall follow while returning home after flooding in order to avoid personnel harm or accidents. The important points are briefly explained below.

1.      Use personnel protective equipments such as gloves, mask, goggles, protective shoe, etc. If all are not available with you, the hand gloves and safety masks are must.  You shall not be alone while entering home first time after flood and no children shall accompany you in that time.

2.      First of all switch off the mains, both the MCCBs (and MCBs) and Isolators or isolate  fuse from  the fuse box. You shall enter house only after confirming this point. Even though your area is without electricity, still switch-off the mains are compulsory. Do not enter in to a flooded home or wet building if the electric power is ON.

3.      Then Switch off the Inverter or UPS if available. Even after the Mains switched-off, Electrical shock is still possible from UPS or inverter.

4.      Open all the doors and windows after entering home. Presence of dangerous gas can be there inside the house due to possible electrical short circuits and also due to presence of flood waste materials inside house.

5.      Un-plug all of your electrical devices, equipment and home appliances from power socket.

6.      Do not switch-on any electrical circuit, devices, equipment and electrical appliances  until completing the below tasks

Ø  Inspection to be carried out by an experienced technician to confirm its healthiness.

Ø  Confirm all the devices are dried very well.

Ø  If suspect faulty, do not try to use it.

Ø  Inspect well all the plug points, main switches; fuse points, etc. to confirm there no abnormality and system is healthy.

Ø  For electrical machines windings, external drying is usually required as self drying of the coils will take many days. Keeping burned lamp near to the coil is a practical solution.

7.      Confirm all the          protective devices such as      RCCB,     ELCB, Relays and Fuses are in perfect health condition. The “Test” button can be used for self testing for      ELCB,      RCCB, etc. if facility is available. If protective devices are immersed in water, it is highly recommended to replace them.

8.      If uses any flooded equipments after flood, it will be too risky. If somebody uses it in unavoidable condition, frequent periodic inspection is required to confirm healthiness of the device such as Panel circuit board, circuit breakers boards, switch boards, electrical machines, Fans, Non-submersible pumps, refrigerators, etc.

9.      Confirm the earthing system for your house is still healthy after flooding. This include equipment earthing, body earthing, earthing wiring, Earth bus, Earth pits, etc.

10.  Wherever printed circuit boards are there such as in Television, Laptop, computer, mobile phones, other communication devices, etc.  Open the device and physically check to confirm no other materials are accumulated over PCBs. If any such things there, clean them well before use

11.  After confirming circuit healthiness, switch-on the main switch/main breaker. If hold all the       MCBs, you can assume the electrical circuits are healthy. If any of       MCB trips, then don’t switch-on those       MCBs until checking the downstream circuit thoroughly.

12.  Then you can plug back those devices, equipment and appliances one by one which already checked & found healthy. If any devices caused tripping of breaker or fuse blown, un-plug it soon and shall not use them until repair or replacement.