Broken Light tube in your tank!

So before I start this worked for me. Im not saying it will work for you or that this is the right/best way to do it just read it and take what you will from it :

This morning when the lights in my tank came on a tube burst in to my tank (EPIC FAIL) Glass and tube chemicals everywhere! So this post is about what I did.

So first thing I did was to switch off everything! and remove filters right away.

Then I caught all my fish and Inverts and got them in at a holding tank ( in my case this was a bucket with the heater in and some dechlorinated water )

Then remove all plants and woods (or any other bits in your tank) i put these in another bucket and tried to clean them as best I could.

Now for the fun bit!

I removed 80% of my tank water and skipped it! I put the other 20% to one side and then removed the substrate, then all the glass from it ( if you have a planted tank i have no idea how you will do this with out having to throw it out??? ) then give it a good clean like the day you got it until the water runs clean.

Then I cleaned out my tank (if you have a broken tube in your tank you will see a white residue floating and sticking to everything, this is what I cleaned from the tank )

Then I re added my substrate and started to add clean water to the tank when half full, now I added the 20% of old water I kept and filled up the rest with new water (so i have 80% new and 20% old water) i then put my filter and heater back in and ran them for an hour.

An hour later I did a 50% water change as normal, and tested my water for everything! and it came out normal ( First WIN of the day!)

I then added my plants and wood back to my tank and waited till the water was back up to temp then re-added my fish and verts as normal.

Its been 12 Hours now and every one is happy and alive!

It took me 5 house from start to finish to fix this mess and I hope if you ever find your self in this mess reading this helps.

The one thing Im going to do as a result of this is set up a spare tank for emergencies!

Please feel free to add comments, what would you do different?? i would love to know.

I would also like to thank Marc (Youtube, Facebook) for his advice, your a star, thanks mate

2 members like this

Comment by Paul V. Rotondi on February 21, 2012 at 11:58am: If at all possible, supplement the bacterial cultures that might've been removed with a good bacterial supplement, like Dr. Tim's Aquatics or API Stress-Zyme...it'll help get everything stabilized as well. Also add Prime to get rid of any residual heavy metal contamination which might still be within your substrate.

It also might help to mount a think sheet of Plexiglass to the bottom of your light fixture as a shield from both water splashing up on to the lights as well as to save you all the work you had to do because of your light failing catastrophically. 1 mm - 2 mm (or 1/8") is all you need.

Great job on the rescue, though...