Exploding Tank

[FishBrain]

OK so here is the story about the exploding fish tank.

In my oldest Daughters room we USED to have a 10G tank ontop of her 5 drawer high dresser, It had been there for quite sometime, at least 1.5 years. Her room is in the basement, next to our computer room.

One day a couple months ago, all the kids were in her room playing, The two girls on the bed and boy was just being boy. well My wife and I are sitting at our computers doing a little work, when suddenly There was this real wierd noise. I figured the noise out to be all the drawers on the dresser opening at the same time, then the BANG came, There was this kind of sliding noise with a swoosh and smash and shatter and explosion and crash all at the same time.

I jump up thinking what the F*#K and go into the bedroom to find my 3 year old trapped UNDER the dresser, which had fallen on its front, with the drawers out and in between boy and the dresser itself, with the aquarium right beside his head with 2 sides blown out of it. Water, gravel, ornaments, pump, heater, and fish EVERYWHERE.

So before I know it I have the dresser and drawers flying out of the way to get at Rooney (boy). Pick him up and he doesn't have a scratch on him. A little, scared, OK ALOT scared. But still not 1 scratch or bruise.

The two girls who were sitting on the bed at the time, are in awe. I asked Anna if she is ok and her answer was "WOW, that was cool". If you knew Anna you would laugh. Eva says her foot is cut, so I look at it and it looks like a tiny little paper cut. We get her to go into the bathroom while we start to look for the fish. in the middle of finding fish I get a call to come and look at her foot, which doesn't have a little cut, its a good 1" gash beside her big toe from the shattering glass.

After glueing it together so it stops opening when she walks I go back to finish fish hunting. Finally find all of the fish, without any casualties.

It took amost a week to finally get everything fully cleaned up and we are still finding little pieces of glass once in a while.

That same night I screwed the dresser to the wall with 3" screws, so it never happens again.

We got to laugh about it after we knew noone was seriously hurt and figured out that the way Rooney was trapped he must have been running away from the falling dresser. Little bugger probably tried to climb it.

I must admit it took a bit of convincing, but my wife talked me into staying in the hobby.

So that was my fun fish summer, and the most S#!T I have ever had scared out of me

OH...Apparently I moved the dresser and drawers on my own to get boy out, but when we were putting everything back together that dresser is one heavy mother to move. Its amazing how strong you get when there is life involved!!!

[Vallisneria]

OMG, your so lucky no one was seriously hurt. That would scare the crap outta me.

I'm sure the same problem could happen with a tank stand. i've seen some pretty tall skinny stands that would easy fall over if child were to grab the front. So everyone make sure your tanks are safe if you have kids around them.

[patrick]

Thanks for sharing that story! I would have had a heart attack......

[webmoose]

mental note... move 2 tanks from 2 dressers soon........

[Finbert]

Holy !@#$ ! I'm glad everybody is OK. And giving some serious thought to what to put my new tank on - maybe not one of those skinny tubular metal jobbies. Not when I have a cat who must. investigate. everything.

[sharuq1]

Hoolies! I'm glad no one was seriously injured. :shock:

[williewonka]

Scary story.

Anyone with small kids... should consider screwing dressers to walls (fishtanks on them or not) as kid's have been known to try climbing up and have ended up pulling the dresser over on top of themselves.

[Terrie Lee]

"WOW That was cool"

LOL!

i am glad no one was hurt.

[dunl]

Glad to hear the little ones are okay. :shock:

Dressers should be screwed to the wall anyway if you wish to be cautious. I didn't until my 5 year old at the time locked my 1 year old at the time in a room by toppling the dresser when she wanted to move it. Yikes.

As for cats, we came home one day to find a huge pddle on the carpet seeping out from under the dresser. Damm, must be a leak. Took the tank (which had no cover) down, pulled the dresser off (one of those ones that sits on the floor with space underneath it). I figured the water was seeping out from behind the dresser.

Hmm, no water under the dresser. No water behind the dresser, or around the tank. Hmmm, water stain on the wall, behind and ABOVE the dresser?

And to top it off....no leaking tank.

Figure the cat must have launched himself onto the top of the tank (remember there wasn't a cover? I knew that - cat didn't). Splash from his cannonball must have flew onto the wall, and the mess out front would have been the second wave coming to the front of the tank and from the cat who probably landed back on the carpet about .7586 seconds after breaking the surface of the water.

[FishBrain]

Thats to funny dunl.

My cat learned a hard lesson that way too

[NatureNut]

I'm so glad nobody was seriously hurt in this incident! Bookshelves should be secured to walls too... ours aren't. maybe that's something I should remedy before we end up finding out what our brute strength in a crisis is.

As for kitties. Mine used to run around like a maniac and tear through the bathtub as part of his route... too bad he didn't know what the sound of running water meant. That was one wet and mad cat!

[Sam Chicklets]

I have heavy duty lids on my tanks as one of my cats thinks she should sit on the tanks, but I'm considering saran wrap as she pulls the media out of the AC filters as well as drinks out of the tanks.