Silver Spring sits on WSSC Water's public sewer, and its median home was built around 1964, so many house drains here have been underground for decades. A sewer camera inspection shows what's happening inside the pipe between your house and the WSSC main before anyone quotes a repair. Call the number on this page to be connected with a local plumber in Silver Spring.
Silver Spring at a glance
Silver Spring borders the District to the north, with a dense downtown surrounded by older residential neighborhoods inside the Capital Beltway. With a median build year around 1964, a large share of houses still have their original building sewer, and in homes of that era the pipe is often cast iron or clay. Cast iron tends to scale and crack from the inside; clay joints let roots in. Both show up clearly on camera. Streets lined with mature trees add roots to the picture, and older lines that were patched over the years can mix materials in the same run.
What to do now
- Stop running water if the lowest drain in the house, often the basement floor drain or a basement shower, is filling up.
- Look outside. If sewage is coming from a manhole or into the street, report it to WSSC Water's Emergency Service Center at 301-206-4002; that's the public system.
- If only your house is affected, the trouble is almost always in your own line, and that's a plumber's call.
- Expect the plumber to clear enough of the clog to get water moving, then run the camera through the line.
- Ask for the footage and the distances noted for each defect so any repair quote can be checked against it.
Symptoms and likely causes
| What you notice | Likely cause the camera can confirm |
|---|---|
| Basement floor drain backs up when the washer drains | Partial blockage or root mass in the main line |
| Clog returns a few weeks after snaking | Roots regrowing through a joint, or a broken section |
| Several drains slow at once | Scale or buildup narrowing an old cast iron line |
| Sewer smell in the yard or basement | Cracked pipe or a separated joint |
| Water pools in the line during the inspection | A sag where the pipe has settled |
What affects the cost
- Access: an open cleanout is simpler than going in through a toilet or a vent
- Whether the line must be cleared before the camera can see
- Length of the run and the number of bends
- Locating defects from the surface and providing a recording
If a repair follows, WSSC Water issues the plumbing permit, and its inspections in central and southern Montgomery County are handled out of its Lyttonsville depot. The plumber doing the work normally takes care of that.
Sewer Camera Inspection questions in Silver Spring
Is a camera worth it for an older home's original drain lines?
Who do I call if a manhole is overflowing or sewage is in the street?
Can a camera tell clay, cast iron and plastic pipe apart?
Does the line need to be cleared before the camera can see anything?
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