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Comment by olyjohn | Hacker News Reader

Is that the point of the air gap? I can't even get a straight answer from plumbers on what it's for. I don't see how that could possibly help with a clogged drain, just seems like a secondary point for the drain water to come out.

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I'm fairly sure the point of air gaps on drainage is to prevent sewerage water from backing up in to appliances if the sewerage line is blocked. It will instead spill on the floor where it will be more easily noticed and cleaned.

That’s exactly what it’s for. If you block the sink drain and fill it with water, you can have water flow down the dishwasher drain hose and into the sump in the dishwasher. If that happens during the rinse cycle you’re rinsing with grey water.

That is exactly why they are required in restaurants. You wouldn’t want the sewage to back up into a sink where food or dishes might be.

Pumped out water has to go somewhere . With the airgap, it will either back out your garbage disposal or pour out your airgap into the sink basin, depending on the location of the blockage.

The airgap causes the pump to be physically incapable of backfeeding the drinking water supply with dishwasher waste

iirc its less about contaminating drinking water (there is a valve and pump to get through. rather tricky) and more about waste getting into dishwasher during cycle and you getting contaminated dishes.

my wife once decided to dump into garbage disposal a bunch of uncooked broccoli at once. it clogged garbage disposal and drain. when i tried to unclog it with plunger it backed into dishwasher (was hooked directly to garbage disposal bypassing airgap). took me hour to get everything out of dishwasher.

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