My 2015 disaster.
Tank: 140 gallon coldwater
Cephalopod: none (thankfully) currently - last resident, Nautilus
While cleaning the tank and changing the filter, I kept feeling water on my head. Only a few drops now and then and initially thought it was my messy water change dripping from the top. Then I felt a spray from inside the cabinet. After bit more investigation and several saltwater showers I realized that the hose barb inside one of the return lines had completely broken with something less than 1/2 inch remaining on one side and the rest of the barb still inserted into the tubing. I could hold the two pieces together but not release them. I kept trying to get the pieces to stay long enough to get off the floor and get to the phone (Neal was an hour away) but all I managed was to take another cold saltwater shower. After an hour of playing little Dutch boy, I spotted a clamp j u s t within reach that was on the table with my grandson's Lego storage project. I spent the next hour trying to find a way to clamp the *&%$# thing but there were not squared edges. Ultimately, I found the clamp was just the right size to wedge between the cabinet opening and the back of the SCWD to keep the flow to a slow drip into the sump. By this time Neal was close to leaving the office anyway but at least I could get to a
(going electric) ,a
a towel (for me and the floor) and start looking for large containers.
Neal had to try his hand at messing with the problem while I started cleaning containers. He managed to get more water on the floor and walls as well as something electronic and got shocked (the main unit is on a ground fault but it did not kick). We did not have the breaker marked so we shut down the whole house because we could not get to the socket. After a few choice words (more about the situation than at each other), we agreed we needed to drain the tank to below the inlet line (about 90 gallons - rooky mistake in our design). We had a properly sized hose barb in our collection of parts and Neal was able to force the broken part forward enough to reattach the line. We used up the 20+ gallons of new water plus much of what we drained and the tank is back in operation.
Clean up crew (full sized shrimp, white hermit crabs and pencil urchin) survived but I am not sure about the abalone. The other abalone (both Asian market "rescues") did not survive a power outage where the chiller did not keep its setting and went unnoticed for a couple days. This time the water stayed below 80 so I am hoping the remaining abalone survived this as well but it is so rarely seen I may not know for months.
Addendum 8/2
We seem to have additional, unrelated water problems this month! Our frig drain was clogged and our water dispenser hose developed a leak, both sending a quantity of water to the basement and kitchen floor. When it rains, it floods