[Asterisk-Users] Asterisk Community Participant; Katrina Refugee

[Rich Adamson]

> For waterlogged equipments, no problem until they are under the water level
> (out of oxygen contact).
> The best way after that will be to clean all of this waste and poluted
> equipments with clear water during a long time (no more chimical products in
> the clean water), and to quickly dry them.

Just to add a couple of comments to the above based on practical
experience with electronics...
- some hard drives are truly sealed (air tight) while others have some
  form of air filter for air circulation. If the drives don't have a
  filter, there is a high probability that simply cleaning the
  drive electronics and drying is all that is needed.
- cleaning almost all forms of electronic equipment with tap water is
  acceptable, but then follow that with a rinse of distilled water.
  (As others have already noted, salt water is the worst to deal with
  after the equipment has been exposed to air.) If you can find a 
  good printed circuit board cleaning solution, use it as a final 
  rinse on electronics.
- clean and rinse the inside of connectors (eg, usb, rj11, rj45, cable
  connectors) is more important then cleaning the external surface.
  Same with plated through holes in circuit boards.
- Hair dryers (etc) can be used to help dry equipment, but be careful
  with assumptions relative to water that might have penetrated some
  components. It may take more time to dry completely then one might
  expect. Don't be in a hurry to fire up the hardware. Letting the
  equipment sit in a low humidity environment for a week or two is by
  far better then being in a hurry to fire it up.
- Speakers will be junk regardless of cleaning methods
- Its not uncommon for commercial recovery companies to suggest keeping
  electronic equipment, books, papers, etc, under water until it can 
  be handed over to them.  (Air contact without proper cleaning _will_
  create more problems then the water itself.)
- disassembling electronic equipment and cleaning all sides of printed
  circuit boards, etc, should be considered mandatory. (eg, remove the
  motherboard and clean it, remove the drive electronics and clean it.)

In most cases the commercial recovery companies don't use anything more
sophisticated then the processes noted above for electronics. They 
just have a little more hands-on experience doing it and we're all led
to believe its magic.