Too late for help...but searching for answers :(

[jschottenfeld]

This was not a good week for my tank.
I've been doing renovation work in my house and all crews have been notified of the importance of extreme caution concerning my tank. This week I was having my hardwood floors sanded and finished and had disaster. The crew shut the 100 amp breaker covering the power to my basement which contains a sub-panel controlling numerous breakers supplying electricity to my tank and forgot to turn it back on. I happened to stop by my house the following day and noticed the power to my tank off. It had been off for approximately 20 to 24hrs. It was early in the morning when I noticed this and my tank was protected in plastic so none of my lights were on and I could not see what was going on inside. Well, the next day I was able to get a look and found that 5 of my 8 fish had died. I lost a hippo tang that I had for 9 yrs and a henioches (sp?) that I had for 8yrs, along with a six line wrasse, Powder Brown and another hippo tang. I was devastated and pissed.
I've had my 125g reef tank up and going for close to 2 years, it was an upgrade from my previous FOWLR tank. Some parameters in the tank are monitored bi-weekly where others monthly, for the most part all levels fall within acceptable limits posted by various professionals. My tank is in my living room with all of my filtration downstairs in my basement. In addition to my Wahoo supply pump I have 3 Tunzes with a multi controller. One of the Tunze pumps is connected to an APC battery backup providing approximately 6 hrs of power.
In the basement I have a 30 gallon fuge and 50 gallon sump. A chiller, Calcium reactor, protein skimmer are also in line. A Reefkeeper Lite helps me control the various devices and lights.
Here's my question or statement...When I found the tank without power the temperature was approx 73 degrees, normal operating temp is 78-79. Even though my main pump was down since the power was shut, one of my Tunze's still moved the water around for approx 6 hrs until the battery ran out of juice. I never would have imagined that this would take out most of my fish. Did they run out of oxygen? What would have been the main contributing factor in their death? Fortunately the majority of my corals (mostly SPS, some LPS) did ok although I'm not fully sure of their outcome.
My flooring contractor has been continuing with stain and polyurethane and I have not been in the house for the past 4 days. Unfortunately I was only able to pull out one of the dead fish, the rest must have wedged themselves in the back bottom of the tank and I don't even see them. That was the really strange part because a couple of them were nice size. Unfortunately I did not have the time to make a new batch of RO water so I just dropped in a few bags of carbon and hoped for the best. My Protein skimmer was working hard and I think that I have to just cross my fingers until I enter my house in a couple more days.
Any thoughts of what would've been the prime factor in their deaths would be appreciated so that I can learn from this.
Thanks

 

[House of Laughter]

suffocation - no circulation=no oxygen.

I would try to get in every day to assess the damage otherwise it could possible be a total loss

Good luck and hope ti turns for the better

House

 

[masterswimmer]

So sorry to hear about your losses and also about your dim witted sub-contractors :banghead:
When you alerted them to the tank and its whereabouts did they mention to you that they intended to shut the juice to that portion of the house?

I'm almost certain, as Jim stated, that the lack of surface agitation led to the tank being depleted of oxygen and then suffocation for the fish. :sad2:

Being in the dark wouldn't have killed any fish even if it was dark for over a week.

Unless the fumes from the polyeurethane were so overwhelming that the skimmer sucked in the toxic fumes and poisoned the fish I don't see any other reason for them to die other than depleted oxygen. This is a stretch because the electric was off, hence your skimmer was off and couldn't suck air through a straw.

Maybe your next visit (should be daily) will prove more hopeful. I hope it does.

Russ

 

[jarofsardines]

my first guess would be lack of oxygen but maybe it was a large pH swing? wouldnt the lights and pumps not running cause the pH to drop? alot of sanding, sawdust in the water? but you said the tank was covered?

i do know that when i transfered my old tank into the tank i have now i lost alot of things. i dont know 100% what happened but it appeared that it was a bad case of chemical warfare and one thing would die releasing toxins to another and so on killing most of my corals AND fish. my tanks a mixed reef so they had fun going at it, i actually think it was those dang green and brown palys that i have 9 million of but anyways my tank was complete milk white with very poor visability the next morning when i woke up.

i would try to get the fish that are dead out ( which by now the clean up crew prob. has gotten to them ) run lots of carbon, empty the skimmer collection cup and it prob. wouldnt hurt to do a water change. im sure a local buddy could spare you a few gallons of RO/DI water, or even already mixed up saltwater.

sorry this happened, i know first hand it sucks.

 

[juiceguy]

sorry for your loss. lack of oxygen for sure. i have done remodeling around my tank and the worst issue was dust throwing my skimmer out for 3 or 4 days. the poly odor is overwhelming but it didn't affect the tank as long as everything is in working order. lack of circulation consumes O2 very quickly in our tanks and if you have a sand bed then rate of consumption is greater.

 

[jschottenfeld]

Thanks for the responses...
Master Swimmer, there were no poly fumes at that point because they were only sanding, and no they never informed me about cutting the power. Unfortunately I was or am unable to see the tank until tomorrow because my wood floors cover the entire main floor of my house and once they start the process you cannot walk on for about a week.

Jarofsardines - The weirdest part was that I could only find one dead fish. I could not locate any of the others, and some of them were 6" - 7". My thought was that the clean up crew and my brittle star were doing their job. Unfortunately I didn't have time to do a water change because it would've taken hours to make the RODI water, I threw in a big bag of carbon. Fortunately my skimmer emptys into my sink and I have an auto top off so I won't run low on water.

 

[jschottenfeld]

At this point is my biggest problem elevated nitrates or amonia? I guess it really doesn't matter because either one will need to be filtered out by natural filteration via my live rock and DSB in my fuge.

 

[KathyC]

Sorry for your losses.
Ammonia is the largest issue at this point.
I'm a little confused, how do you know which fish are dead, but you couldn't get them out? Were they just the ones you didn't see?

I'd try and find out when they are between coats on the floor - THEY are walking on it to put down the additional coats.
The least you might be able to do is get some Prime or AmmoLock in there to try and help with some of the ammonia issues..I fear another week with that much ammonia in the tank (if all of those fish are dead...) and you won't have anything left at all

 

[jschottenfeld]

Kathy, I was able to walk on my floor for a brief period after they finished the sanding, before staining and poly. Yes there was 1 fish that I saw dead and 4 others who I did not see, even after putting some food in the tank. The ammo lock sounds like a good idea although at this point it has been close to a week since I've been allowed to go in. I'm sure that my crabs and starfish are having a party.....unfortunately at my fish's expense.

 

[KathyC]

My concern is that even if you have a huge clean up crew, that's still an awful lot of fish to digest. The ammo-lock would help enormously at this point.
Keeping my fingers crossed that a couple were hiding...

 

[masterswimmer]

At this point you really shouldn't be feeding the tank either. No need to add any additional waste products into the tank. The fish that have survived (hopefully all the ones you didn't see ) will not be any worse for wear without food.

As Kathy said, if you can get some Ammolock into the tank you could save yourself from some potential losses.

You said something that could be an additional problem. Your skimmer dumps directly into a sink. You have an auto top off. If your skimmer went nuts and began skimming very wet, it could possibly dump gallons of SALTwater into the sink. The auto topoff would replace that water with FRESHwater. See where I'm going with this? Your salinity level would be at risk of dropping. Just be aware of that possibility and check your salinity right away.

Best of luck,
Russ

 

[jschottenfeld]

Thanks for the input on the skimmer/auto top off changing the salinity of the water. I don't believe that will be a problem because my ATO is directly plumbed into my RODI but I also have it on a timer so that it can only produce about 2 to 3 gals per day. I will look into the Ammolock tomorrow, the first day that I can walk on the floors.

I have not been feeding the fish, I just put a little food into the tank to see who would come out from hiding.

 

[KathyC]

Need to add one more thing here to what Russ said..and I have often seen it mentioned on threads here as well..

Not sure if I am off the mark, but for you folks who have an ATO hooked directly to a rodi..is that rodi water already in a storage bucket and you are making it all at one time OR does your rodi come on & make new water automatically to fill your rodi bucket on an on-going basis?

I know that when I am making rodi water - I run it for a minimum of 10 minutes (into the sink drain) before it produces water suitable for use (with a TDS of 0)..and only then do I fill up my top off bucket.

Just wondering as it can add up to a fair amount of not so healthy water if done on an ongoing basis.

 

[masterswimmer]

Need to add one more thing here to what Russ said..and I have often seen it mentioned on threads here as well..

Not sure if I am off the mark, but for you folks who have an ATO hooked directly to a rodi..is that rodi water already in a storage bucket and you are making it all at one time OR does your rodi come on & make new water automatically to fill your rodi bucket on an on-going basis?

I know that when I am making rodi water - I run it for a minimum of 10 minutes (into the sink drain) before it produces water suitable for use (with a TDS of 0)..and only then do I fill up my top off bucket.

Just wondering as it can add up to a fair amount of not so healthy water if done on an ongoing basis.

+1
I run mine for about 15 minutes before I use any of the output.

R

 

[jschottenfeld]

Kathy, my ATO is hooked up directly inline with my RODI, and I have heard what you said from other people about running it for 10 to 15mins before using. Here's my $.02....I have a TDS meter hooked up to my RODI, about once every week or so I check the TDS input level....39 or 40 input.....0 on the output, so I have to believe it's good to go.