Fire & Smoke Damage Restoration

A house fire doesn't end when the flames go out. Smoke pushes soot deep into porous materials. Water from suppression saturates everything below. Odors embed in drywall, fabric, HVAC. The first 48 hours decide whether the damage stays surface-level — or becomes permanent.

CPR's fire restoration team is dispatched within 60 minutes of your call, day or night. Our IICRC Fire & Smoke Restoration Technicians (FSRT) arrive with the full toolkit: emergency board-up materials, soot-extraction equipment, ozone generators, hydroxyl machines, structural drying gear, and the documentation tools your insurance adjuster needs.

What our fire damage restoration includes

• Emergency board-up & tarping — same-day securing of broken windows, doors, and roof openings to protect from weather and theft
• Water extraction from fire suppression — most fire-damaged homes also have water damage from hoses and sprinklers; we treat both at once
• Soot & smoke residue removal — dry sponging, wet cleaning, and chemical neutralization specific to the type of soot (wet, dry, protein, fuel oil)
• HVAC & duct cleaning — smoke and soot travel through the air handler; if not cleaned, odor recirculates indefinitely
• Odor neutralization — hydroxyl, ozone, and thermal fogging treatments — not just masking, but molecular-level removal
• Content pack-out & restoration — inventoried removal, off-site cleaning of salvageable items, climate-controlled storage
• Structural restoration & rebuild — drywall replacement, framing repair, flooring, paint, finishes — same team, same project

The science of soot — and why DIY makes it worse

There are four primary types of soot, each with different chemistry and different cleaning protocols. Dry soot (from fast, high-oxygen fires like paper) wipes off relatively cleanly. Wet soot (low-oxygen smoldering fires) is sticky and smears under pressure. Protein soot (kitchen grease fires) is nearly invisible but coats every surface in a thin, foul-smelling film. Fuel oil soot (furnace puffbacks) is acidic and corrodes metals.

Cleaning the wrong soot with the wrong method drives it deeper into the substrate. We identify soot type during assessment and match the protocol — dry sponges, alkaline cleaners, solvents, or abrasive blasting — accordingly.

Working with your insurance

Most homeowner's policies in Pennsylvania cover fire damage as a named peril. The challenge isn't usually coverage — it's scope. Adjusters write scope based on what they can see. Soot in the wall cavity, smoke in the HVAC, or pre-loss code upgrades required for rebuild are routinely missed on the first estimate.

CPR writes scope in Xactimate (the same software your adjuster uses), documents loss with photo evidence, and files supplements when the rebuild scope expands during demo. You don't pay us until your insurance settles — and we negotiate directly with the adjuster.

Typical fire restoration timeline