We’ve all been there – we’re washing the dishes or rinsing them to put in the dishwasher and something happens to cause a glass to break. At least in broke in the sink, right? But now the problem is that some of that broken glass has gone down the garbage disposal.

What do you do?

Don’t panic – follow these easy steps and you should be fine. But if you have any problems – call your plumber right away.

Steps To Follow If You Have Small Pieces Of Glass:

  1. If you now that the pieces of glass that have fallen in the garbage disposal are very small, then simply turn on your water and your garbage disposal and let it run for awhile. This won’t hurt your garbage disposal.
  2. Once you are down you can drop some ice cubes down the disposal and with the water on, run the disposal to grind up the ice cubes. This will help to ensure that the disposal is clean.
  3. When you are completely done then fill the sink with water and let it drain slowly. This is something that can be done overnight.

Steps To Follow If You Have Large Pieces Of Glass:

  1. BUT – if there are large pieces of glass in the disposal – DO NOT ATTEMPT TO GRIND THEM DOWN IN THE DISPOSAL UNIT.
  2. Instead, turn the power to the disposal off by switching off the breaker.
  3. Use kitchen tongs to pull out the glass pieces out of the disposal unit.
  4. Discard the glass pieces in the garbage – be careful not to drop it or to cut yourself.
  5. If you have trouble using kitchen tongs – find several potatoes that will fit in the garbage disposal. Cut one in half and with your hand (wear safety gloves) jam the potato down the garbage disposal so that the glass gets embeded into the potato. Then pull the half potato out.
  6. Keep repeating this until you see no more glass in the potato.
  7. Once you’ve removed the larger pieces of glass you can then clean out the garbage disposal of the smaller pieces of glass by following the previous steps.

You shouldn’t have any problems performing these steps but if you do, or you just don’t feel comfortable doing them, contact your plumber immediately.

If you have any questions about garbage disposals, call Atlantis Plumbing today at 770-505-8570. We are available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.