When friends are staying at their home while they’re out of town, you always want to leave where they’ve come from. The cups are not broken, have no major stains and most importantly, are not seriously damaged.
But a Wisconsin couple were left stunned when a giant pole blasted through the ceiling while they were out at a friend’s house.
The occupants of the house were shocked one night when steel drainage, waste and ventilation (DWV) pipes “bumped” through the rafters.
After the ordeal, the man shared his situation on Reddit as u/culastewiz, where hundreds of commenters marveled at the unusual phenomenon.
“It’s an old abandoned DWV pipe,” culastewiz, who asked not to be named, told us. Weekly newspaper. “Before the current owner bought the house, someone must have plugged it up, but nothing was done to protect the pipes.”
u/culastewiz/Reddit
DWV pipes are used in plumbing systems to drain waste water, treat waste, and ventilate sewer gases and odors.
While they are an essential part of any plumbing system, ensuring effective waste removal and ventilation, they can become unused and unnecessary in a home.
One of the reasons DWV piping may not be usable is due to renovations where the piping layout has changed, or because it was installed as a spare or replacement pipe but was never used.
It is common during home construction and renovations to discard or seal off a length of pipe, but it must be disposed of properly when it is no longer needed.
Most commonly, the pipes are capped or plugged to prevent any gas from escaping into the living space. Others may decide to remove the duct section entirely and seal the opening.
“I believe normally it would have been tied to the rafters or removed, but it appears the disused pipe was just secured by caulking around the roof rubber boots, as you can see in the imgur photo album above,” says culastewiz .
“It’s been very hot in Wisconsin for the past few days and I think the caulk is finally gone and the pipe is free falling from the first floor trench into the basement.”
u/culastewiz/Reddit
Thankfully, no one was in the house at the time and no one was injured by the falling pipe. But when the couple returned home, they were shocked and documented the unusual phenomenon with photographs.
On Reddit, people were similarly shocked by the pole and shared their reactions in a series of comments after the photo was shared on the site’s r/WTF subreddit.
“The next thing a team of firemen will slide down,” joked one commenter, while another said: “Looks like the attic is full of strippers.”
“Are you lucky that it didn’t hit you, or unlucky that there was a pillar going through your roof?” asked another commenter.
“They were good friends, so my wife and I saw the pipe, put in more pipe, and cut it again until the whole pipe was removed,” he said. “We also added to the roof where the hole was. Waterproof board.”
