What to do in the first 24 hours after a burst pipe
A half-inch supply line puts out roughly 50 gallons an hour at normal household pressure. If it lets go behind a kitchen cabinet while you are asleep, that is several hundred gallons into the subfloor before anyone notices. What you do in the first few hours decides whether this is a drying job or a reconstruction.
Minutes 0 to 10: stop the water
Nothing else matters until the water stops. Find the main shut-off before you start moving belongings.
- Inside the house, the main is usually where the supply enters — near the water heater, in a utility closet, or in the garage.
- Outside, it is at the meter near the street, and may need a meter key to turn.
- If the leak is at a single fixture, the local stop valve under the sink or behind the toilet may be enough.
- If water is anywhere near outlets, the panel or a ceiling fixture, shut off power to that area at the breaker before you walk through it.
Minutes 10 to 30: call it in and start documenting
Call a restoration company before you call your insurer. Mitigation is time-sensitive and nearly every policy requires you to take reasonable steps to limit the damage, so getting a crew moving is the correct first call. Then photograph everything before you move a single item.
- Wide shots of each affected room from the doorway, so the extent is clear.
- Close shots of the failure point itself, if you can see it.
- The water line on walls, cabinet bases and furniture legs.
- Anything valuable that got wet, photographed where it sits.
- A photo of the shut-off valve in the closed position, with a timestamp.
Hours 1 to 4: limit the spread
Lift what you can
Get paper, textiles, electronics and anything with a wooden foot off the wet floor. Furniture legs stain carpet permanently within a few hours — slide foil or a plastic tub lid under them if you cannot move the piece.
Open interior doors and cabinets
Air has to reach the cavities. Open vanity and kitchen cabinet doors, and pull out the bottom drawers so the carcass can dry from inside.
Do not use a household vacuum
A domestic vacuum is not rated for water and will give you a shock hazard and a dead motor. Mopping and towels are fine for surface water in the meantime.
Leave the windows alone if it is humid outside
Opening up only helps when the outside air is drier than the inside air. In coastal California in the morning it often is not, and you will add moisture.
Hours 4 to 24: extraction and the start of drying
A crew should be extracting standing water on the first visit, not booking a return. After the bulk water is out, the job becomes measurement: moisture meters and thermal imaging find how far the water travelled inside walls and under flooring, and the drying equipment is placed to that reading rather than to what the floor looks like.
Expect air movers and at least one dehumidifier to be left running, and expect to be told not to switch them off. Drying stops the moment they go off, and a few hours of silence can add a day to the schedule.
What your insurer will want
- The date and time you discovered it, and when the water was shut off.
- Photographs taken before anything was moved or removed.
- The cause, if it is known — a failed hose, a frozen line, a cracked fitting.
- An itemised scope of work from the restoration company.
- Daily moisture readings proving the structure was dried, not just surface-dried.
Sudden and accidental discharge from plumbing is covered under most California homeowner policies. Gradual seepage that has been happening for weeks usually is not, which is the main reason the discovery time and the first set of photographs matter so much.
The 48-hour line
Mold begins to colonize damp organic material at roughly 24 to 48 hours. Before that line you are paying for extraction and drying. After it you are paying for remediation, containment and often replacement of material that could have been saved. That is the entire argument for calling at two in the morning instead of waiting until the office opens.
