Can staying aboard be saved?

[mikedefieslife]

Originally Posted by Boosted

Don’t mess with black mold! Get rid of that crap as soon as possible, you’ll get the cancer...

About 60% of UK homes must have some black mould in them.

[Cadence]

Originally Posted by dmksails

My Tashiba-31 is located in Port Townsend and I've live aboard now for over 6 months. The experience has been great, until recently.

In December, I left for a 3 week trip to Minnesota visiting family. When I leave the boat closed up for pit it does get a bit musty and stale below. I was also concern that the wet weather might contribute to that, so I got a small jar of Tea Tree Oil gel and left it open on the counter.

I returned to the boat after 3 weeks away. Inside she seemed fine - a slight odor fro the tea tree oil was it. I spend a few hours stowing all my gear, then lay down in the v-berth. I normally sleep with the v-berth hatch open a crack and my main hatch is louvered, so I get pretty good ventilation.

Well, after being asleep for 2 hours I suddenly woke up with the intense feeling that I couldn't breath. The feeling was so bad I had to get out of the boat. Never had that happen before. I was so keyed up that I ended up staying in the cabin the rest of the night. I would still get that feeling, but not as intense.

After 3 days of this I hit on the idea that maybe I was having a reaction ot the tea oil. I tossed the jar as far away as possible and opened all the hatches for a good flush as the wind was up and it wasn't raining. That night I sleep almost normally, but still in the cabin.

Since then the problem is coming back. It's been raining, so I can't keep the hatches open as much. Now I'm wondering about a reaction to mold. I don't think I have a huge problem with it, but there are areas of the boat that don't get good circulation and have a definite musty smell.

The thing that I don't get is the timing of this. I've had the boat for over a year. In the first 6 months she spent a lot of time closed up between visits. During the visits I would stay onboard for 1-2 weeks at a time doing maintenance and cleaning. During the first of these visits she smelled a lot worse than she does now. So besides the tea oil, what else is new?

I'm going to do a stem to stern cleaning with vinegar this weekend. I'm also looking for someplace to clean my cabin cushions as they have a musty smell and I'm looking into a hepa-filter air purifier. I also have a Doctor appointment to look into what is going on.

Assuming this is a reaction to mold - do you think these actions will work? Any suggestions? Has anyone else had a similar reaction to tea oil purifiers?

I've found a few drops of iodine in a spray bottle does wonders for mold. I don't know if it is mold specific.

[seasick]

You didn't mention your age, but I, at 63, had very similar symptoms last year wherein I'd wake with trouble breathing and an intense desire to get out of the hatch where my breathing quickly returned to normal.

I learned that my symptoms were very common to congested heart failure (CHF) of which I was diagnosed.

The other most common cause of these symptoms is a withdrawal from opioids.

[weavis]

I second the ozone generator.
Whenever I buy a boat, I put it on for 3 hours a day for 5 hours in different places. If I had a problem with mold, which I dont know, I dont have anymore..

[CHRIS V CLEMENT]

I too leave my boat closed up for extended periods of time. Black mold was a serious issue until I installed two solar powered vents through the deck. One is forward. One is aft. One is set up as an intake vent. The other is set up as an exhaust vent. The constant movement of air has eliminated all mold issues.

[bensolomon]

I'm a pulmonary and Critical Care physician. You may compound your breathing problems by layering chemicals in a confined area like a boat cabin. Please get a respirator from home Depot, or wherever, before using any of the cleaning solutions, even vinegar. The acetic acid may trigger bronchospasm or worse.

Also, from a symptom management perspective, your breathlessness may be a condition called orthopnea....that is breathlessness when laying flat. There are many causes of this, and it is a serious symptom. Please go see a pulmonary physician, specifically. Your family doctor or internist may not deem this serious, but it can be.

[jmcaleer]

As a follow up to an earlier response- and a gentle correction. Do you have any form of heater going? Or a generator? If so this may VERY well be symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning. ( as a correction to an earlier poster- it is CO, not CO2, while that is potentially lethal as well, unlikely in this scenario). If you are living aboard I would strongly urge you to get s carbon monoxide detector. I’m a working paramedic and sadly we find people dead each winter from using space heaters and other combustion devices in closed spaces. A big tip off is that the symptoms disappear or at least lessen when you exit into fresh air. I know that mold can cause horrific health problems but I’m not so sure that symptoms come and go that specifically with an immediate change in environment

[kish]

Originally Posted by dmksails

My Tashiba-31 is located in Port Townsend and I've live aboard now for over 6 months. The experience has been great, until recently.

In December, I left for a 3 week trip to Minnesota visiting family. When I leave the boat closed up for pit it does get a bit musty and stale below. I was also concern that the wet weather might contribute to that, so I got a small jar of Tea Tree Oil gel and left it open on the counter.

I returned to the boat after 3 weeks away. Inside she seemed fine - a slight odor fro the tea tree oil was it. I spend a few hours stowing all my gear, then lay down in the v-berth. I normally sleep with the v-berth hatch open a crack and my main hatch is louvered, so I get pretty good ventilation.
;
;

I'm going to do a stem to stern cleaning with vinegar this weekend. I'm also looking for someplace to clean my cabin cushions as they have a musty smell and I'm looking into a hepa-filter air purifier. I also have a Doctor appointment to look into what is going on.

Assuming this is a reaction to mold - do you think these actions will work? Any suggestions? Has anyone else had a similar reaction to tea oil purifiers?

If there is a musty smell onboard, there are mold spores in the air, not a good thing to breathe.
The humidity on board must be high.
Do you have heating on board? Do you have a propane gas heater onboard, which will produce a lot of water vapour as a product of combustion.
You must reduce the humidity level to contain the mold spores.

It will be very worthwhile to use a dehumidifer, which will reduce dampness from the air within.
Many dehumidifiers have an additional operational mode of air purifying.

Stay away from ozone generators. The EPA is not impressed with claims made for ozone indoors.

https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quali...d-air-cleaners
[I]"There is a large body of written material on ozone and the use of ozone indoors. However, much of this material makes claims or draws conclusions without substantiation and sound science. In developing Ozone Generators that are Sold as Air Cleaners, the EPA reviewed a wide assortment of this literature, including information provided by a leading manufacturer of ozone generating devices. In keeping with EPA's policy of insuring that the information it provides is based on sound science, only peer reviewed, scientifically supported findings and conclusions were relied upon in developing this document."
https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quali...d-air-cleaners

[Cherod]

shucks,, life can be hard sonme times ?

[thruska]

Use thieves oil.
Research it.
Use it.
It combatted the plague. It works.

[Steadman Uhlich]

It sounds like a reaction to Black Mold to me. (As others have suspected.)

I once stayed in a ranch house that had black mold hidden under the carpet and in the walls. The guest room smelled musty, and each night I had difficulty breathing, with some congestion.

A family came to visit, and I moved to another room temporarily to allow them to have the bedroom.

Soon after going to bed, one of the two guests (a young woman) who stayed in that room woke up barely breathing (like an asthma attack). It scared her parents, and they left in the middle of the night to go to a local hotel. The owners of the ranch never used that room (only for guests) so they were not aware of the problem.

I did some investigation, and found the source was the Black Mold, which was caused by a leaking bathroom drain/tub in the bathroom which shared a wall with the bedroom. I never slept in the room again. I am now much more aware of the problem it can cause and would consider Black Mold to be a "deal killer" on any boat.

Good luck on fixing your problem. IF you want to keep the boat, I would install some Dorade vents and other solar powered fans for more ventilation when you are gone or on the boat too, after eradicating any mold you can.

[weavis]

As a physician myself, I always look for the most likely cause of a problem that appeared out of no where. With boats and these SX expressed, I too would suspect Black mold given the environment and circumstances.

A quick visit to your local physician will eliminate other possible scenarios or find that one is responsible.

Any advice I give regarding Black mold is from my own experience. I have had excellent results from a good quality ozone machine, and on several occasions.

A reproducible quality response.

That is good enough for me. Rent a professional one that is powerful enough to do the job.

Clean and clean again, wipe down, Ozone it and put in VENTILATION. That is the key.

Good luck my friend. Its worth the effort.

[Steadman Uhlich]

Here is a search of the CF Archives for more threads about Black Mold:

https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=011403...old&gsc.page=1

[Cherod]

whats is this " townsend WA " where the hell are you,,, cast off those ropes and head south young man,,, enjoy

[hellosailor]

You could call in one of the clean-up companies that specialize in house floods and fires. They've got the right tools to do a thorough clean-out. Or DIY. Steam generator or hot water spray into all the odd places to clean as best you can, anything porous off the boat and cleaned commercially if possible, look at it as what it is: A full hazmat cleanup operation.

Since you can't ever get into all the places where mold may have gotten, I would suggest that after the gross cleanup, you run an ozone generator to penetrate further, and then add a UV-C air sterilizer in the boat to circulate and sterilize the air on an ongoing basis. UV-C is used commercially, even in hospitals now, because literally the UV-C light rays destroy DNA. Anything that passes close by gets killed, and that will work as well or better than running a HEPA rated air filter in the boat. Although, you can probably get a home HEPA filter, maybe 18 across and two feet tall, for under $100 at any appliance store. That requires changing the filters on an ongoing basis, and the UV-C fixture would be smaller.