It's a rat trap

There are not too many contracts where you have to consider rats as a potential hazard.

In this particular barn the water pipe feeding the cows and pigs ran through galvanised steel caps fitted tightly to the pen walls. When I say tightly, that was the assumption which was so badly wrong.

The water pipe was 25mm Blue MDPE which was layered with frost protection trace heating cable and mineral fibre insulation sections. Regrettably the sealed metallic capping had been modified to allow cables and outlets to be fitted and this allowed the rats to enter this dark and warm place next to a ready supply of food and water.

This capping ran in multiple lines over an 80m length and the Barn Town Rats thrived in the Rat Run.

These rodents need plenty of water and must also keep gnawing to wear down their teeth. What better place than a dark duct with mineral fibre for nesting, trace heating cable at low amps for chewing and of course water pipe for gnawing. And if it gets too wet, then move further up the duct and chew, gnaw, nest some more. 

So back to the job.

Repair / replace missing insulation from exposed pipework, disconnect redundant pipes where dead legs were in place and carry out minor repairs to trace heating cable. The exposed areas were simple enough and there was only minor damage to the cabling. There was some evidence of long deserted nests and so we were armed with the appropriate PPE - coveralls, splash goggles and chemically resistant gloves – which, with a fetching pair of white wellingtons, made a significant fashion statement.

However, to remove the dead legs we needed to also remove the steel caps. That is when we disturbed the rats and found that the visible nests were just the tip of the iceberg.  

The morning after the steam cleaning machine had broken as the rats had made a new nest and gnawed the power cable. This was not a job for RAB and so a local contractor called Extreme Environmental were called in to assist. They stripped off the metalwork, cleared out the nests and cleaned the pipework and walls with a disinfectant and biocide.

They looked like people from an Ebola outbreak station with their facemasks, full body coveralls, boots, safety goggles and gloves but, as rat mess contains particularly harmful diseases, it was the only way to tackle the problem.  Whilst they were cleaning and making safe they also discovered further damage to the electrical cabling, trace heating cable and junction boxes. More leaks appeared as we stripped the steel ducting away from the walls and the job started to grow substantially.

No longer was it a minor repair as we needed to make safe the cabling, remove rat damaged and wet insulation and repair a lot of pipework leaks.  And, as any pipefitter will tell you, as you repair one weak point and refill the system the next weak point fails leading to more repairs. 

Oh yes and what of Big Bertha. She was the only rat who did not run away when we disturbed her nesting point. Instead, she just stared straight at me and did not move a muscle. And yes she was alive and no I was not braver than she was. 

That is why the farmer was called to do what farmers do best and us lightweight engineering types did a swift exit from the building.