My nightmare came true

[havefun]

Well I'm not sure where to start...
We left for a 1 week vacation. I had everything taken care of, my sister was going to do topoff's and feed every-other day. She has experience with fw so I knew overfeeding would not be an issue. I had plenty of fw and sw made up for any emergencies though just in case. I had 3 fish at the time, 1 singapore angel, 1 O. clown and 1 green chromis.
Two days after we left she calls to say she can't find the angel anywhere, he didn't come out at feeding time either which is not a good sign. I had her check ammo and everything is in check.
She calls again the next day to say that my clown is now gone (my favorite), does another ammo check.
Two days later she calls and says there is a piece of tail missing from the chromis. I have a CBS but didn't think they would attack like that. I also have 40# of lr.com rock with assorted hitchhiker crabs which are getting fairly large but have only seen them picking at the rock. I also have seen a pistol but there are others I have not seen so it's possible it/they could be mantis. Guess I'll have to set some traps and see what I have...
But there is more to my story...
Came home yesterday to find the water level was way down. Not evaporation down but like something wrong down - about 20 gals low 8O .
The intake portion of my ph's were under water but the output was shooting up into the air geyser like. I found the problem surprisingly fast, I use cable ties to strap some filter pad to the output lip of my remora skimmer to prevent most of the bubbles from returning into the tank. Apparently it had slipped off and she put it back on but when she did she got it bunched up way too high which created a "dam" effect. The excess water was spilling down the back of the tank and onto the carpet.
So now I have a dehumidifier and a fan running trying to dry it up. I suppose it could always be worse but sheesh....
Anyway, if you're still reading this thanks for giving me a shoulder to cry on

[Gatorfreak]

Wow, that really sucks! I had a minor flood a couple weeks ago when my auto-topoff didn't stop topping off until it had flooded my sump and my living room. It was only a few gallons though.

I swear sometimes I feel like my tank is just a disaster waiting to happen. 90 gallons of water waiting to be spilled everywhere.

[mentallylost]

I am sorry for your loss. It makes me nervous to go on vacation now.

[haus]

I'm never leaving my house again!!!!

[SALTYDAWGY]

Sorry to hear about that. IMO I think the fish would have been okay without a sitter for just one week.

[skank-a-holic]

sorry to hear

[lando]

Sorry to hear about your troubles. It seems soooo many of these bad stories start with somethng like, "I just got back from vacation and..."

[Scatcat]

Humm I just back from vacation and the person I asked to feed my fish didn't. I came home to low water because the top offs weren't done I think he did it one day. My fish has ich and my plate coral died.

[ashobson]

Where dose all the water go? Do you really have to add that much? I might add 1 gal every couple weeks. I went away for 9 days 8 nites and my sister inlaw did a great job feeding my tanks I had bags in freezer marked for each tank and each day all she had to do was put thursday 29 gal in 29 gal on thursday and thursday 54 in 54 on thursday. I told her if she missed a day throw it a side in freezer not to try and make it up. I must be lucky.

[Scatcat]

Evaporation. Not that much to add just needs to be done daily or your salinity gets off. I put mine if bags with labels for each day, he still didn't feed it. Your sister might be more intellegent than the person doing mine. I think normally you should be fine.

[havefun]

Where dose all the water go?

In my case it went all over the floor. I normally have to add 1 - 2 gals every other day do to evap.

Thanks for all the kind words.

Well as of yesterday my only remaining fish, the chromis, is gone - vanished without a trace. My CBS is going back to the LFS (he's got a guilty looking grin on his face). I'm still going to set some traps but do mantis take out fish as well?

TIA