Do you find yourself constantly mopping up the pool of water that keeps mysteriously appearing under the drawers at the bottom of the fridge? You aren’t alone, and it can be frustrating when you can’t find the cause.
But actually, the explanation is very simple, and was recently explained in a viral TikTok clip. The video, posted by electrical retailer AO, has been seen over 1.6million times, and people were shocked to realise why it kept happening.
In the video, captioned ‘If you’ve got water gathering at the bottom of your fridge, you need to watch this video’, they explained: “If you’ve got water gathering at the bottom of your crisper drawer, it might be because your drain hole is blocked. Now I know, this isn’t the most exciting topic of conversation but we need to know how to deal with these things, so let me show you how.”
In the clip, the AO employee shows a hole at the very back of the fridge – which it turns out many people didn’t even know existed. The hole was clogged, which is why condensation from the fridge didn’t have anywhere to escape. But luckily, cleaning it couldn’t be more simple and all you need is two items – a straw cleaner and a cloth.
A straw cleaner is long and has bristles so you can get it into the tiny hole to get all the gunk out. “Once you start cleaning the inside of the drain hole make sure you give it a wipe just to get rid of that excess water and just repeat until nothing further comes out,” the staff member said.
They added: “Once you finish just give everything a wipe down with a bit of spray and you’re good to go.”
And it turns out many people were experiencing this problem without knowing the cause. One person wrote: “Oh my god you have no idea how long this has been happening, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.” Another added: “Thank you for the great advice! I did it and almost puked, but my fridge is now fixed.”
A third commented: “I was ready to buy a whole new fridge,” while someone else said: “Wait… a fridge, has a drainhole?..”
These days fridges often will come with a cleaning attachment to clean the drain hole, but if not you could also use a cotton bud. If in doubt about the best approach, you should always opt to read the manufacturer’s instruction manual thoroughly for best practices for your appliance.
