As we know, death can be messy. So messy that it could even include blood stains on your living room wall. Most of us, the lucky ones, know this when we see it on TV. Many TV shows portray post-death scene, involving police & paramedics who are questioning and treating the people around. What you mostly don’t see on TV is what happens when everyone is gone, when it’s just the family left in the house with blood stains in the scene of murder or death. One thing first responders don’t do, is clean the place.
Up until 2000, there were very few crime scene cleaning agencies into existence. Before this, the job of cleaning the remains of a deceased person were on the family members. An almost unimaginable task to do, not to mention horrific & grieving. There was a need for professionals who would know how to asses this situation and clean the whole place up leaving no trace of blood or other remains. This meant that the cleaners needed to be specially trained & would need in-depth knowledge to complete the cleaning properly. This job is not for the faint-of-heart or stomach.
In case of violent death in someone’s home, the family doesn’t normally move out. This means that the crime scene cleaners have to do their work while everyone is living in the house and at the end of it, eliminate all traces of the incident in the house. One requires special knowledge to handle biohazardous waste and to know what to keep an eye out for. Also, cleaning isn’t all that there is. Once you’re done cleaning, you need the necessary permits required to transport and dispose of the waste to a safe spot.
Crime scene cleaners are used to handling a variety of situations ranging from violent deaths to suicides to decomposed bodies of old people including meth lab cleaning and at times even tear gas cleanup. Each of these come with their own methods of cleaning and health hazards. Crime scene cleaners are the second responders to the crime scene and pick up where the first responders left off.
Crime scene cleaners stand out in a crowd with the suit and the gear they carry. Once a complete situation assessment is done, they decide which tools to use to best restore the place back to its original condition. Some of the tools they use are as follows:
- Personal Protective Gear
- Biohazard Waste Containers – To carry all the waste out.
- Old school cleaning supplies
- Ozone machine – To get rid of the odour.
- Various other tools to remove bodily fluids and other matter from the walls and carpets.
Each type of cleanup jobs comes with its own horrors. A tiny drop of blood carrying infectious diseases can be very harmful to the cleaning agents. In case of suicides, there’s a lot of blood when someone cuts his wrists or shoots himself in the head. A shot to the chest, however, involves less blood as the lungs manage to suck up most of it. However, little blood or not, the crime scene cleaners have to approach and treat it as though it is infected with bloodborne pathogens like HIV, hepatitis and hantavirus.
We at One Prime Remedial Solutions provide a complete crime scene cleanup and are fully equipped to deal with any situation that you have to offer. Call us to know more.