Behind the gates of Perfection Paint and Auto Body in Vero Beach, Ashley Tardi shows where the damage has been done.
“When you’re driving through water, it will suck up through the motor," she says as she pops the hood of a small sedan.
You can smell the mold, and see its impact on the seats.
“We look for damage on the outside of the car first to see if it impacted something but when the vehicle goes through water, we immediately look at the motor," said Tardi.
Inside the garage, there's another automotive flood victim with a puddle of cloudy motor oil underneath it, a telltale sign that this car lost its battle. Tardi, like many others, say the best advice is not to drive through any floodwaters.
While there’s no hard and fast rule of how much water you could drive through, six inches of standing water can stall an engine, and according to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, a foot of water can cause a car to float.
