What is tank CRASH? [Archive] - Reef Central Online Community

dancewithethan

02/02/2009, 01:36 AM

Can someone go into details to what is a tank crash? or if you have experienced your self, maybe you can tell us what happen to your tank.

Thanks

Ster

02/02/2009, 01:40 AM

Any time a tank experiences a large number of deaths of coral or fish. Often it's due to a significant spike in nitrates, phosphates, or other toxins in the water.

VacavilleFC3S

02/02/2009, 02:39 AM

nitrates and phosphates do not cause crashes......

dkirchoff

02/02/2009, 04:52 AM

A for effort though !

InsaneClownFish

02/02/2009, 05:52 AM

A tank crash is a significant number of deaths of corals and fish due to some issue within, or outside of, the tank.

For SPS keepers a tank CAN crash if there is a significant and instantaneous spike in nitrates and phosphates and STN sets in.

More often than not, a tank crash has something to do with something more serious. Ammonia spikes due to a cycle- can be caused in a variety of ways.

Severe temperature fluctuations.

Complete loss of flow and oxygenation.

Salinity issues- more rare.

Equipment going offline.

Equipment malfunction.

Chemical issues- overdosing, using "reef safe" products that cause water chemistry issues.

Many of these crashes are directly related to power failures.

rhunter513

02/02/2009, 10:49 AM

I would say a tank crash is when you lose your lifeline - the bio filtration. Something causes a large death of most of the bacteria on your live rock/sand, which causes ammonia spikes and kills all your livestock.