Death of a large reef tank

[Paolo Piccinell]

It has been a long time since my last post here...

Two weeks ago a tragic short circuit caused a 16 hours blackout.
The surveillance monitors didn't notice the power failure and the UPS did not last enough

Nothing has survived in my tank... I lost all the fishes and corals.

The attached picture shows the tank at its best, one year ago:

 

[Paolo Piccinell]

It was a nightmare... the smell, the smell of death will remain in my head for months.
I lost huge corals and fully grown fishes... I cried as a baby for them!

I sworn "I'll never have an aquarium again"... but I could not resist, the need for an aquarium it's bigger than me.

This week I cleaned everything and I'm setting a new deep sand bed.
Next weekend I'll put in the dried rocks recovered from previous layout... hope to be ready for lifestock beginning of september.

 

[CuzzA]

Wow, that sucks. Are you certain everything is dead? I've actually researched some of your tank as I plan on implementing a few ideas to my new tank. That's a shame.

Not sure if you have a controller or not, but if you register with www.reeftronics.net they will contact you if they loose communications with your controller after one hour.

Edit: Obviously you're last post answers my question.

 

[dave.m]

What a tragic loss! I'm glad you were able to overcome your sorrow and have now rededicated yourself to a new reef. You are much too good a reef keeper for our community to lose you now.

Dave.M

 

[ca1ore]

Yeah, that totally stinks. Think on the bright side, though; the most fun is in building out a new tank ..... so you've that to look forward to!

 

[Coelli]

Apex Fusion can SMS and email you if there is a power outage. I'm so sorry.

 

[nuxx]

Wow horrible

 

[sarens]

terrible, sorry for your loss, I see you still keeping your chin up, that is what is important, enjoy the new build out

 

[nighthawk26]

Horrible.

I'm still getting everything together for my 220 build, and already have nightmares worrying about this sort of thing!

 

[Kaidman]

That picture of "tank at it's best" is simply amazing. I had a similar situation with my tank and lost a lot of livestock. In my next house I really want to have a generator that automatically takes over in these situations if I can work it into the budget.

 

[Defenseman7]

Absolutely heartbreaking to see such a beautiful tank perish. I agree with Dave M. and would hate to see someone of your talents leave the community. Especially when I could learn from you.

I wish you lots of success in your new endeavor!

 

[darcy777]

So sorry

So sorry

Paolo, I have look at your tank on reefkeeping over and over. When I clicked on the link and found out it was one of my favorite tanks I couldn't believe it.
Best luck with your new endeavors.
Shayne

 

[shellsea]

Dispiace per latua perdita Paolo.

If my translator is right that means so sorry for your loss Paolo. I have often admired your tank and agree w/ others here, don't give up because of this. Learn how to best avoid it in the future and enjoy the new build and new life.

 

[ravi197699]

Sorry to hear this... I saw first picture that shows beautiful corals, Incidents similar like these make us leave this hobby,,,

 

[ca1ore]

Horrible.

I'm still getting everything together for my 220 build, and already have nightmares worrying about this sort of thing!

I think a tank 'crash' is almost inevitable if you stick around in the hobby for long enough. Although not a total wipeout like the OP, I've had two crashes in 25 years. More you stock the tank, and the more exacting the animals under your care, the less the margin for error and thus the higher the probability.

Modern technology helps, certainly, as does a bit of not-so-common sense in how you design things. One of my crashes I'd avoid based on how I run my tank now (runaway ATO) but the other would still get me (house heating failure). C'est last vie!

 

[coral102]

Sorry for your loss! Hope to see your beautiful tank soon!!!

 

[CuzzA]

Apex Fusion can SMS and email you if there is a power outage. I'm so sorry.

Are you sure? I don't see that option.

 

[nighthawk26]

I think a tank 'crash' is almost inevitable if you stick around in the hobby for long enough. Although not a total wipeout like the OP, I've had two crashes in 25 years. More you stock the tank, and the more exacting the animals under your care, the less the margin for error and thus the higher the probability.

Modern technology helps, certainly, as does a bit of not-so-common sense in how you design things. One of my crashes I'd avoid based on how I run my tank now (runaway ATO) but the other would still get me (house heating failure). C'est last vie!

runaway ATO? Meaning it just kept topping up and either over flowed, or dropped salinity too low? Both? What do you do now?

 

[ca1ore]

runaway ATO? Meaning it just kept topping up and either over flowed, or dropped salinity too low? Both? What do you do now?

I had it setup in about the worst way possible. RO (no DI back then) direct feed to a float switch controlled solenoid. Float got stuck closed and dropped my salinity below 1.05 over the course of a weekend - and flooded the basement to add insult to injury. Now, no 'infinite' reservoir, multiple redundant switches and failsafe with Apex salinity monitoring.

Sorry for the hijack

 

[Paolo Piccinell]

Thanks everybody!
Frankly speaking, the most important reason to keep on reefing were my friends supporting me exactly as you are doing here right now.

GSM phone module will me my next gadget.
Since I have the tank at office, I have a contract with a private security agency and they should call me if there's any power fail... last time the power fail was limited to the aquarium switch so they did'nt notice.

In Italy we use to say "Good luck is blind, bad luck sees you very well".
Probably a fish did splash some water on RO solenoid that went shortcircuit...

Well... let's look forward!!!
Rockwork is already assembled in the yard on a wooden pallet... some more days of drying under sunlight and it will be transferred to tank.

I'll keep you updated... thanks again.