Stop the water first
For one fixture, use the shutoff under the sink or behind the toilet. For a burst pipe or a leak you cannot trace, close the main where the water enters the basement near the meter, clockwise until it stops.
A sewer backup is the emergency people wait too long on
When wastewater comes up a floor drain or a first-floor tub instead of going out to the street, the main sewer line is blocked, and every drop that goes down anywhere in the house now has nowhere to go but back up. It is unpleasant enough that people hope it will clear on its own. It will not, and running more water makes it worse.
Stop using water in the house, and call. We clear the main line, then camera it so you know whether this was a one-time clog or a sign the pipe itself is failing, which in older Greater Boston homes it often is. Our drain cleaning page covers how we tell those two situations apart.
- Stop running water anywhere in the house until the line is clear
- Keep people and pets away from the standing water; treat it as contaminated
- Note whether it backs up when you run the washer or a shower, which tells us where the block is
Water heaters and washing‑machine hoses fail fast, and they flood
Two of the most common indoor floods we clean up after start in the same corner of the basement. A water heater that has rusted through does not drip; it opens up and puts forty or fifty gallons on the floor, then keeps refilling and dumping until the water is shut off. A brittle rubber washing-machine hose can split under constant line pressure and spray until someone notices.
When a tank lets go, close the cold-water valve on top of the heater and cut its power or gas, then call. We handle the emergency, and if the tank is done we talk through repair versus replacement on the spot; the trade-offs are on our water heaters page. Braided stainless hoses and a drip pan under the heater prevent a lot of these.
Commercial emergencies are about getting the business open again
For a restaurant, a salon, a medical office, or a managed building, a plumbing emergency is not just water on the floor, it is a closed door and lost revenue by the hour. A backed-up floor drain in a dish pit fails a health inspection; a single out-of-service restroom turns customers away; a leak over a tenant's unit is a midnight phone call.
We take those calls the way the situation demands, contain the immediate problem, and give the person responsible a clear read on what happened and what keeps it from repeating. Our commercial plumbing work is built around business hours and building operations, so the fix accounts for tenants, kitchen schedules, and the reality that the space has to reopen.
