Kid puts vegetables in HVAC vent
A client of ours called about a bad smell coming out of her HVAC vents.
- I was dispatched for a vent cleaning and possible vent sealing.
When your vents stink, it can be anything from mold to a dead animal the crawled into them and died. Thankfully, this one did not end up being a dead animal but it was a strange one. It seems that vent was not covered in the kitchen and their 6 year-old child had been throwing food down there, unbeknownst to the parents. I guess this is a family that has to clean their plates and the kid just didn’t like certain food. Whatever the cause, there was now several weeks of old molding food in the HVAC vent that I had to clean out. And the house stunk. Man did it smell bad. The lady of the house had some scented candles around but it did little to help the situation. Apparently they have been trying to figure out where the smell was coming from for some time. I ended up doing a complete and thorough vent cleaning. I also cleaned the HVAC system really good and installed charcoal and baking soda filters. It took all day and was really nasty work. Most of the food in the vent was unrecognizable. It had all molded together or, in some cases, turned to a sticky, watery liquid. I also put a cover over any vents missing cover and suggested the child’s seat be moved away from the vent for future meals. I doubt I will have to tell our clients this twice as they were rather upset to discover the cause of the stink.