Warning to all, please read !!!

I wanted to try and make sure that no one has to go through what I have been through.

Quick background, I have had a 90gal acrylic, reef set-up and running for about 8-10 months, I had just upgraded my lights to Metal Halides and HVO’s, had Eric make me a new refugium, and was just starting to get a handle on my algae. I went out of town for three days. On the second day I received a call from my parents that were watching my house, checking on my dogs, and checking on my tank.

The call was to let me know that I had a fire; it resulted in a 100% loss of all the contents of my house, and most of the interior structure. And of course the tank melted, my floor looked like a beach from all the live sand, and live rock…my smoke detectors melted into something that looked like they belonged in a cave, the light switches looked like a drips of wax. The only positive thing is that no people were hurt.

The fire was caused by the build up on the electrical contacts on a surge protector where my lights were plugged in. When the lights turned on by timer for the day, there was an arc/spark that caused the fire.

The surge protector, ballast, refugium, and most everything was in the stand. I feel that I contributed to the build-up by packing so much in the base of the stand. The other warning the fire inspector gave me was to be very careful in the future and to not overload the circuit, because he had seen a number of other fires caused by other aquariums.

So my warning/request is to have everyone take 15 minutes and look at their set-ups, make sure you aren’t overloading the circuits, and that you have as much of your wet things as far away from your electrical as possible. As well as look behind all of our TV’s and stereo equipment at the rats nest of power cords and make sure you aren’t overloading that area either.

The question I get asked most is “so are you going to have another tank when your house is re-built”?

And like most of us the only answer is “YES”, but during the rebuild, I have the contractor opening an access down through the floor, so that I can relocate all of the refugium/skimmer, pumps and everything wet downstairs, below the tank, and I am having the electrician run two circuits to aquarium  area.

Its been three months since the fire, and I am hoping to be back in my house by this April, then as usual with us reefers I am going to go bigger, maybe a 110 or 275 gallon tank……

Thanks for taking the time to read this, and please learn by my loss, spend 15 minutes and check everything out!!!!!

Randy (H20)

Smoke Dect.

Door Bell

Hood and Lights

In my systems, powerstrips are either outside the stand or firmly attached to the stand up near the top inside. Inline ballasts are always positioned outside, either hanging on the stand or laying on a block on the floor

Where was this one located?

That sucks. I had a powerstrip that was on the bottem of my stand arc out while we were sleeping. It tripped the circuit and I had a sudden awakening when I turned it back on and it arced again. On all of my tanks I have made sure that any power strips are out of the way.

When you get to the point of preparing your new tank, You might consider building a power box like this one. It has timers built into it.

Good luck. Its a crappy thing to go through.

Suzy I wouldn't think you would need to go all the way to the ceiling to stop water contact or salt creep from getting to the plug.  You could put them up on the wall so the power cords have an upward angle, and far enough to the side so that if a tank were to burst or spill over the water really would have no way of getting to the plug.  Using a GFCI outlet will also help in the safty process.

If you add a new circuit breaker box, and build a box like Dions so you have one appliance per plug you should have no problems with overloading your system.  The most conservative option is no more then 1 appliance per plug.

And if you need to use an extention cord and power strip they make heavy duty outdoor products that have water proof connections.  I can't remember what they call them, but I know there out there.  We hade some for our trip to Nicaragua, and I think they were purchased at home depot.

I had a power strip go bad on me.  Luckily I was in the office at the time and could smell the ozone from the sparks.  Had to reach in and flip the switch right next to the sparks.  Learned a lot from that, mostly to keep power strips far enough away from the water.  A water proof power strip would have helped a lot also, and I will certainly look at getting one for the new tank.  Unfortunately, I have to have everything inside my stand because it is in my waiting room where I have to keep little hands from playing with things.

Fax