University facility staff takes quick action to disinfect buildings after a staff worker tested positive for COVID-19.
The Project: A Florida university and public research institution. It offers bachelor’s, master’s, and doctoral degrees to around 54,000 students, making among the 10 largest universities in the United States.
Ongoing building operations
The Concern: A staff worker was tested positive for COVID-19. The university quickly realized that the indoor environment used by the infected person needed to be immediately decontaminated. They knew it was necessary to protect other staff and ongoing building operations.
The Solution: University facilities contracted Pure Air Control Services to provide an emergency response, based on their past performance relationship. Pure Air Control’s solution was to utilize their proprietary, multi-level, PURE-Decon building disinfection service. Working closely with the university critical information was ascertained and a plan was developed to ensure a successful outcome. The data identified who was infected, the location they primarily worked in, and the areas they traversed to get to and from there.
Infected staff member
This hand-held spray method coated and disinfected wherever the mist permeated
It was determined that a combination of PURE-Decon Level I, II, and III would be needed in multiple buildings to confidently remediate the risk. High touch in all suspected areas were first electrostatically sprayed with a disinfectant for emerging pathogens (DEP).
This hand-held spray method coated and disinfected wherever the mist permeated. Since the DEP is positively charged, it’s actually attracted to surfaces. Next, the most frequented areas used by the infected staff member were hand-wiped with a DEP. Then the HVAC system that supplied these areas was disinfected.
Electro-Statically spraying
This was accomplished by electro-statically spraying the supply and return ductwork DEP, as well as using PURE-Steam to clean the air handling unit and evaporator coils. Finally, a letter of completion was issued. It included a detailed synopsis of the work performed to provide additional assurance of risk management for reoccupancy.
One of the areas disinfected was a campus museum. A special protocol was designed due to the sensitive nature of the artifacts located there. This included erecting containment barriers, minimizing the use of DEPS, and in their place using a dry steam variant of the PURE-Steam process.