Tank horror stories

[Bouke]

I am going to share a NIGHTMARE i had one of my first years in the hobby.

I was 13or14 It seemed like a normal morning wake up to 7:00 to a new regular day of school. Or so i thought I roll over to see my mom standing there with an odd look on her face. I asked here what was wrong she said come up stairs quick. So i ran i had no clue what could have happened. I look around the corner to see my brand new (used) 30gl fish only stocked full with 7 fish half empty with a big water spot surrounding it on the carpet. Of course we had it upstairs what could happen. I found out that there was a huge crack along the whole bottom of the tank. water was pouring out by the second. Just remember one goodthing came from this i got to skip a day of school. Of course the nearest town with civilization was 1.5 hours away. My poor mother had to drive all the way to duluth as i sat there with old metal pans under the stand waiting for them to fill and then dumping them back into the tank. I whent through this cycle about 5000 times at least.


I have to go now i will finish this story later

feel free to post any of your own horror stories any time.

 

[reedman]

I just had my seaswirl drop into the tank (while plugged in) and let me tell ya...it doesn't tak elong for the corals to take a big hit.

I've also (in my early years) made the mistake of using a maxijet 1200 to dose Kalk as my topoff. All it took was one float switch stick to take my PH up to 9+....fish don't survive long at that PH.

 

[Detri]

A few months ago. My Pair of Ocellaris had gotten Ick. My first and only fish in the tank at the time. When i tried to get the hospital tank up and running I bumped it, it fell over and smashed. I had to wait for 3 days to get paid so I could buy a new tank. I ended up losing one of my clowns.

Well they weren't mine, My friend had bought them for my daughters Birthday. One for each of them. Needless to say i had a big mess to clean up after we explained to my daughters what had happened.

 

[Krish]

When I did my regular water change this weekend, I started back up all of the pumps when I was finished and wondered why the sump was going empty and not filling. By the time I got up to see what happened, the water started pouring over the top of my tank and onto the floor! My aqualifter had a crack in it and wasn't working! I pulled off an old light fixture I use for my water changes so it wouldn't get wet and leaned it up against the wall and before I could get back to what I was doing, the light fell and shattered a 4ft bulb all over the floor!!! Worst water change ever

 

[Reefdaddy1]

I got one, I have 2 160 gallons in my garage. I had RODI unit that filled a 55 that gravity fed to the sumps with a floatvalve to regulate replenishment. I was in garge and checking my tanks ( doing tests) and all of sudden I her this loud "Crack" It startled me so I started search for cracks in tjhe 160's. I bet down to put hand under to search for water and "whoosh" the 55 gallon side panel let go. Water dumped into both tanks and all over my lighting. I lost 4 MH 10k bulbs that exploded on the lower unit and 3 ballasts 2 MH and one IC660. Needless to say I was soaked as well. I spent the entire day taking glass out of the lower unit from bulbs and what was left of the side panel. Thank god I had enough stored for adequate water changes in both tanks. I called all Glass who made the 55 and they sent me new one free. Cant complain about what happened it wont do any good, but I did get a new 55 outs the deal. lol

 

[ratherbediving]

I just had one a few days ago.

My tank is being kept at our inlaws house while my wife and I try to sell our condo. On Sunday night at 2:00 am, I get a call from my brother in law-- about 1/4 of the tank was empty (55 gallon tank) and water was all over the floor.

Turns out the rubber suction grips on the pump failed and the pump shot water out of the tank. I have a cover over most of it, but the access holes to the tank only have egg crate. Of course, the water shot out of there.

I still don't know where all the water went. I am worried that there is water that I can't find inside the walls somewhere. I think a lot of it was absorbed into the concrete; we only cleaned up a few towels worth of water (the tank is on tile, not carpet luckily), but I am pretty worried about water damage.

Livestock is (I hope) all going to recover.

 

[Krish]

Welcome to RF "ratherbediving"! Hope you enjoy it here

 

[spongebob lover]

hehe hmmm my worst night mare it wasn't actually tank related well sort of .
I left running my RO/DI water for 2 days :lol: and ... yeah well since here apartments aren't built that good... well the water went down to the neighbours apartment.... the manager told me to get rid of my tank ... ha like that was gonna happen ohh yeah and did i mention i did this twice :lol: ... i'm laughing right now but at that moment i had my husband screaming to the top of his lungs and letting me sleep on the couch .

 

[twilliard]

Well here is my first one
There was just a thread about water temp. talking to some one about keeping temp constant.
Well for the last 2 days I couldnt figure out why my water was getting so warm 83+ degrees.
Tonight I noticed I didnt have any flow through my lower spray bar. Well the pump was seized and then became a great heater in the tank.
I dont think I lost anything, but goes to show the smallest thing can realy take a hit on a tank.

 

[morgan]

a mate of mine had his walls and celling and the electricty cables in the wall got stuffed just from salt evapration now thats bad he had a 3000l tank and ive only seen pics but damn it was nice
i have heaps of bad storys like the time i thought it would be a good idea to do my water to ups with saltwater or turning my temp up on purpose or the 4 glass plates i broke i can keep going but i try to forget these events

 

[jetaero]

I came to my tank one morning... The water was completely white and cloudy.. Couldn't figure out what was wrong... Ran some tests, things still looked fine. I put my hand in the water, and was suprised as it felt like bathwater! I pulled out my digital temperature reader, and it was 90°! I pulled out everything I had in there, moving it either to trash cans, or other aquariums in the case of corals. Lost quite a bit, but was a good lesson to me, to always use a temp controller.

-Josh-

 

[Saltyfish]

This happened to a good friend of mine but I was a witness.

180 gallon tank on a pine stand. UV Filter started leaking on to the electric strip after he changed the pump. The leak went undetected, but he remembered having an issue with the UV filter fitting before.

Right after he changed the pump we went to eat. Ran around for about 2 hours. We got back to see the stand in flames and the tank explode from the heat. The water killed the fire but everything was a total loss.

Note to beginners GFI Plugs work, please use them!

 

[acrylic_300]

I came home after a weekend get away and my central air unit was stuck on high. The temp in my house was well over 90 and the tank was right at 90. I lost a few things and saved a few things.

I guess i'm lucky that's all that has happened so far.

 

[Myteemouse]

This just happend to a friend of mines cousin last week!
He was doing some maint...on his tank with his son and it was getting late!
He sent his son to bed and said he would finish!
The next morning the son came out of bed to find his sister was still sleeping on the couch!
So he went to his MOM to complain that his sister got to sleep out there!
So mom came in to the living room to see what was going on and found the father DEAD on the floor under the tank from electricution!
GFI's would have saved his life!!

 

[chend2]

What? Your friends cousin died last week from tank electrocution? It takes more electricity than your would get from a household outlet to kill you....

 

[trido]

It takes more electricity than your would get from a household outlet to kill you....

Umm. Go stick your hand in your tank and grab a bare electrical cord. JK!!!! I wouldnt recommend that! Not a good idea. Yes! A houshold outlet can and will kill you. Maybe not like the electric chair but can surely give you a heart attack.
That is one of the many reasons GFI's were invented.

Heres a quick quote

Installed household wiring was responsible for 11% of electrocution deaths in the US 2001 (US Consumer Product Safety)

 

[brandyrb]

I came home from work one day to the worst smell of something burning and ran throughout the whole house trying to figure out what it was. Finally, I looked at the fish tank to see fish panting and corals dying, then I noticed a nice coat of oil at the water surface and a RIO 2100 power head had blown its top and had a large crack in it that was leaking oil and electricity into our tank. I called my husband freaking out. Our sailfin tang was laying on his side and having a hard time breathing, so I grabbed him with my hand and put him in a 30gal trash can I had full of mixed saltwater for the upcoming water change. After a few minutes he started swimming again. I then did a 30 gal water change and put the fish back in the aquarium after unplugging and taking the power head out. All the fish lived, all the corals died. After that incident, I said I was done with the hobby, but my husband kept it going.

My husband finished the lower level of our house and put a 300 gal aquarium in the wall. He decided to run our RO/DI to make up some new saltwater and left forgetting he turned it on. This was before he installed a float valve. One of us (I don't remember who) went downstairs to find 1/3 of our brand new carpet that cost $1500 soaked in 30-35 gals of water. My husband spent the day sucking up the water with our steam cleaner and had to tear up the carpet and put a dryer under it for a couple of days. The pad that was soaked got replaced and my husband had to reinstall that section of the carpet which we paid to have professionally installed the first time. After this incident, I went out and bought two water alarms that are now on the floor in the fish room.

[Edit] Our sailfin tang earned the name Hercules and I will never use another RIO power head in my aquarium again. After the power head incident, I searched the web to find we weren't the only ones that experienced one blowing up in our tank. I do use a RIO power head to mix the saltwater though. [/Edit]

 

[Saltyfish]

Brandy

I am in the same boat. I used to swear by RIO but after my 1400 pretty much came apart in the sump I only swear at them now. Mine was no where near as bad as your issue but I never trust a RIO when I set up a tank now. I do however use a 1400 to mix salt. Even the one I use to mix salt has stopping and starting issues. Oh RIO where did your quality go?

 

[tamarindthai]

all of my are GFI,,,,from my past experienced,,all RIO pumps are suck!!!hot ,eletrical leakage,cracked,,,still wonder why this people still in business,GFI saved me ,neice and my tank many times,JMO

 

[BCT182]

I mis read the kalk label on the kent marine brand were it stated one teaspoon per gallon of fresh water. I thought it meant tank volume and added 50 teaspoons of kalk powder to my 50 gallon tank.......

When I woke up the next morning it looked like an aquarium filled with milk.