Possible Fire Damage

[RHNewfie]

Firstly I am glad that everyone was ok!!! And I have the deepest sympathy for you, its a long road after something like this. We went throught the same thing las February and they just laid our hardwood floor last week... Yeah 9 months later...

Make sure you are on top of the rebuild contractors... Check everything that they do... They are in it to make money and will do everything they can on the cheap... That's my best advice.

If the room was filled with smoke then your humi is a loss.. The cedar is like a sponge... So are the cigars.

I made a valient effort to save my cigars. I got a new cooler and got it ready, some fresh cigar boxes, an oust fan, and a couple of those arm-n-hammer stickups along with the proper humidification stuff.

Put it all together and then I put my cigars in. I changed the humidification device as it got smokey as well as the stickups and the cigar boxes periodically. Opened and aired out the cooler every day. Eventually the funk got less, some cigars neve seemed to improve so I pitched them.

Eventually the remaining cigars became smokeable, but still to this day have a funk to them. I am still looking after some of them but have no high hopes of improvement.

Let me know if I can help in any way!

Oh, the insurance co will not replace tobacco.

[Mugen910]

I'm glad everyone is ok...please let us know if there is anything we can do.

[bobarian]

Sorry to hear about your loss. Sounds like RHNewfie has laid out a good plan. Let us know how everything works out.

[lightning9191]

Sorry to hear about the fire....I'm glad to hear everyone is okay. One way to check if the fire affected the cigars would be to smoke a cigar that you have smoked a lot of or have smoked recently. I would pay particular attention to the pre-lit draw flavors/aromas.

[Footbag]

Sorry to hear about the fire. I would smoke one, and if it's bad, just plan on reporting it to your insurance company.

There is a reason you have been paying the premiums for all of those years. Don't let yourself lose out during a claim. Also remember that sales taxes should be included in your losses.

[Don Fernando]

Sorry to hear about the fire, hope everything is ok with you and your family.

Did the cigars get all wet due to the water, or are they 'unharmed'? That would make a hell of a difference. If they are soaked, I would toss them, otherwise I would try them. And claim them at your insurance (unless they are cc's)

[Boobar]

Originally Posted by Don Fernando

Sorry to hear about the fire, hope everything is ok with you and your family.

Did the cigars get all wet due to the water, or are they 'unharmed'? That would make a hell of a difference. If they are soaked, I would toss them, otherwise I would try them. And claim them at your insurance (unless they are cc's)

The cigars didn't get wet, the humidor had a little moisture on top of it but not bad and the room was not filled with smoke to the best of my knowledge. Within an hour after the fire I had the humidor out of the house and in a safe place. I have tried to smell the humidor itself and I don't get a smokey smell from it and the cigars smell OK. I just smoked a 5 Vegas Series 'A', one of my favorites, and it tasted fine. I just ordered a new humidor from CI to replace the one that I currently have. I am going to continue to smoke through the current stock of cigars in hopes that the rest of them are OK as well.

[Prefy]

Originally Posted by RHNewfie

Firstly I am glad that everyone was ok!!! And I have the deepest sympathy for you, its a long road after something like this. We went throught the same thing las February and they just laid our hardwood floor last week... Yeah 9 months later...

Make sure you are on top of the rebuild contractors... Check everything that they do... They are in it to make money and will do everything they can on the cheap... That's my best advice.

If the room was filled with smoke then your humi is a loss.. The cedar is like a sponge... So are the cigars.

I made a valient effort to save my cigars. I got a new cooler and got it ready, some fresh cigar boxes, an oust fan, and a couple of those arm-n-hammer stickups along with the proper humidification stuff.

Put it all together and then I put my cigars in. I changed the humidification device as it got smokey as well as the stickups and the cigar boxes periodically. Opened and aired out the cooler every day. Eventually the funk got less, some cigars neve seemed to improve so I pitched them.

Eventually the remaining cigars became smokeable, but still to this day have a funk to them. I am still looking after some of them but have no high hopes of improvement.

Let me know if I can help in any way!

Oh, the insurance co will not replace tobacco.

I would take the advise of a guy that's been though this.

Sorry to hear about the fire but I am glad to hear that noone was hurt.

[Scottw]

Terribly sorry about the loss. It happened to me last year on my 31st birthday, it sucked. I would get them out of that humi and into a tupperware and let them sit for a few days and then try to detect any odor. You'd be surprised how long that smell will linger. If the humi was cracked or had water in it though, I would toss it all. Sorry again. If you need any help with anything, PM me .

[dannyboy]

Sorry for your loss bro, glad everyone was safe. As for the cigars, it sounds like they might be OK, since you said the 5 Vegas was still good. Hopefully the rest make it, too. Thoughts and prayers for you in these next several months as you deal with this.

[RHNewfie]

Hey, maybe you got lucky and your house didn't fill with smoke like mine did. Our furnace kicked in and blew the smoke everywhere.

One word of advice though, if you are wanting the insurance co to replace the humi you will most likely have to bring it back into the house so the clean up crew can remove it and catalogue it with the contents that are being disposed. That's what I had to do.

Jeff

[Boobar]

Originally Posted by RHNewfie

Hey, maybe you got lucky and your house didn't fill with smoke like mine did. Our furnace kicked in and blew the smoke everywhere.

One word of advice though, if you are wanting the insurance co to replace the humi you will most likely have to bring it back into the house so the clean up crew can remove it and catalogue it with the contents that are being disposed. That's what I had to do.

Jeff

My wife and I are cataloging all of our contents and then sending a list of items with their value to the insurance adjuster. Our insurance adjuster told us to rent a dumpster and as we cataloged each item to then throw it out so that we knew what we had done and what was still left. We are heading down this morning to get started.

[RHNewfie]

Fun fun fun!!! We were lucky that the clean up folks did all the cataloging, it would have taken us forever!! We are still going through the list to determine values!