Project · Resort and accommodation
Flood recovery at Daintree Eco Lodge
Early in 2019 the Daintree River passed a flood height that had stood for 118 years. Flood water went through the main reception building at Daintree Eco Lodge, and BH Electrics worked directly with the client on the recovery.
The job
- Client
- Daintree Eco Lodge
- Where
- Daintree
- Sector
- Resort and accommodation
- Engaged
- Directly by the client
- Year
- 2019
What the weather did
In one deluge the region took almost 500mm of rain in twenty four hours, 300mm of it inside six hours. The Daintree River rose to almost a metre above the highest level recorded there in 118 years.
Flood water reached the main reception building at the lodge, which also houses the kitchen and dining area.
The order of work after a flood
The first job is never repair. It is isolation. Every electrical service in the affected area was isolated and made safe before anything else happened, and a site assessment was carried out for the safety of staff and everybody else on the property.
Only then does anything get turned back on. Areas that were unaffected were assessed and re-energised so the lodge could keep functioning, and a full audit was compiled of the electrical work needed to bring the rest back to standard safely. That audit is the document the whole recovery runs on, and it is worth insisting on one: it separates what was damaged from what merely got wet, and it is what an insurer, an owner and an electrician can all work from.
What the rebuild covered
- Strip-out of all affected electrical and data services
- Strip-out of the water treatment plant distribution board
- Upgraded distribution board and circuit protection
- Replacement distribution board for the reception building, covering the kitchen and dining area
- Complete new fit-out of the kitchen and its appliances
- New data rack and switchgear
- A comprehensive network speed test by a third-party contractor, to meet the lodge’s own compliance requirements
- LED upgrade to the kitchen and the deck dining area
Why the upgrade went beyond replacement
A flood-damaged board gets replaced rather than repaired, and replacement work is built to the standard in force now rather than the one that applied when the building was first wired. In practice that usually means the protection on a rebuilt board is better than the protection on the board it replaced, and it is part of the job rather than an extra.
It is a distinction most owners meet for the first time in the worst possible week, which is the argument for understanding it before one.
The trades involved
What this job drew on
Straight answers
Questions this job answers
What is the first thing an electrician does after a building floods?
Isolate and make safe, before any assessment and long before any repair. Water in a building means the state of every circuit is unknown, so the supply to affected areas is cut and proved dead first. Then the site is assessed for the safety of anyone on it, unaffected areas are checked and re-energised so the business can keep operating, and a full audit is compiled of what has to be rebuilt. That was the sequence at Daintree Eco Lodge in 2019.
Does flood damaged electrical work have to be upgraded, or just replaced?
Replacement work is built to the standard in force now, not the one that applied when the building was first wired, so a rebuilt board generally ends up with better protection than the one it replaced. That is worth knowing early, because a rebuild to current standard and a like-for-like reinstatement are not the same scope. Your insurer and your electrician should be talking to each other about which one is being priced.
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