What to Do When a Pipe Bursts
A broken supply line puts water into the building at about the rate your shower does, and it does not stop on its own. The first ten minutes decide how much of this is a repair and how much is a rebuild. Work in this order.
Do this now
Shut the water off at the main. In most Treasure Valley homes it is in the garage, at the crawlspace access, or on the street-side wall of a basement.
A fixture stop only closes one fixture. A line broken inside a wall keeps running until the main is closed.
With the main closed, open a low faucet: a basement sink, a laundry tub, an outside hose bib.
That drains the water still standing in the pipes out through a drain instead of out through the break.
Cut power to the wet rooms at the breaker, but only if the panel is dry and you can reach it without stepping in water.
If getting to the panel means walking through standing water, stop. Call the utility or an electrician instead.
Photograph and video everything before you move anything, including the failed pipe or fitting.
The claim is decided on what can be shown. Ten minutes of phone video taken before cleanup is worth more later than anything you can reconstruct from memory.
Get standing water off the floor. Towels, a squeegee toward a drain, or a wet/dry vac on hard surfaces.
Lift furniture off wet carpet, or set foil or wood blocks under the legs.
Furniture stain and metal rust bleed into wet carpet within hours, and those marks do not come out.
What makes it worse
These are the ones that turn a manageable loss into an expensive one, or cost people their claim.
Don't wait for your adjuster to approve anything before you stop the water and start drying.
Mitigating further damage is a requirement in nearly every homeowner policy, not a favor you do the carrier. Waiting is the thing that gets denied.
Don't put box fans on wet carpet and call it drying.
Fans move air, they do not remove moisture. Without dehumidification you push humid air into wall cavities and grow mold in a place you cannot see or reach.
Don't assume the drywall is fine because the surface feels dry.
Water wicks up gypsum and runs sideways along the bottom plate. What shows on the surface is usually the smallest part of what is actually wet.
Don't let "the plumber said it's dry" close the file.
A plumber's job is the pipe. Finding water in a wall cavity or under a floor takes a moisture meter and thermal imaging, and a repaired line says nothing about what the water did on its way out.
Don't turn the main back on to test the repair while nobody is standing at the break.
Restoring pressure is when a second failure shows up. Have someone at the repair before anyone touches the valve.
The clock
Mold begins colonizing wet organic material in roughly 24 to 48 hours: drywall paper, carpet pad, framing, cabinet bases. Materials that could have been dried in place on day one are often cut out and hauled off by day three. The cost difference between those two outcomes is the reason this page exists.
Call us when
- Water reached carpet, drywall, insulation, cabinets, or the subfloor.
- You cannot tell how long it ran, like an upstairs line that let go while the house was empty.
- Water came through a ceiling, or you see a wet ring spreading on one.
- The floor is dry to the touch but the room smells damp or the baseboard is swelling.
If it’s past what you can handle, call.
A person answers 24 hours a day. Even if it’s just a question.