Nearby house explosion and dead fish

[mgrasinger]

Hello! Thank you for reading about my unusual problem – I sincerely appreciate any insight.
A house exploded on Saturday about ¼ mile away from my home. Fortunately, there was no apparent damage to my house, but my house shook, and my windows rattled. If you want more information about the explosion, you can google search Plum Borough Pennsylvania House Explosion.
I have 2 pond that share the same water though a small stream – the first pond is 10x6 approximately 18” deep, the second pond is 10x20 and is a zero-entry pond that goes to about 3 ½’ deep. The small pond had about 20 goldfish and the big pond has 3 very large koi and too many goldfish to count. The explosion took place around 10:30am on Saturday. Most of the fish in the large pond stay deep until the sun hits the pond around noon, although there are always a few outliers. The small pond is covered in water lilies to protect from the Blue Herron, so it’s really difficult to see exactly what’s going on in that pond.
On Sunday I noticed 3 dead fish floating in the big pond and 2 in the small pond. I had no sickness or dead fish prior to the explosion. On Monday I had 5 dead fish in the small pond, Tuesday 6 dead in the small pond and Wednesday 4 more dead in the small pond. So here’s my questions:
Is it possible that the house explosion (ground seismic event) could cause my fish to die or should I be looking at a different problem? I had no debris enter my ponds to my knowledge.
If this explosion could cause a fish kill, would it be immediate or could they die over days. As I mentioned, there’s a lot of foliage in my small pond and I can’t get a real good look at what fish are still in there. However, it seems like they are swimming around one day and dead the next.
Would the depth of the fish at the time of the explosion have anything to do with survival rate. Or maybe it could have to do with the volume of water as to how well the shock was absorbed.
Could I expect to have more dead fish – how long would a fish survive this event before dying?
I had 6 neighbors that perished in the explosion and 20 neighbors displaced, this problem seems so meniscal, but I have lost so much control of so many things, I just need to understand why this is happening to my pond fish. Or maybe this problem is coincidental, and I need to be looking at something else. Any thoughtful responses or insight is sincerely appreciated.

 

[Lisak1]

Wow! That's a horrific story! I am so sorry for all those who were affected by this truly terrible event. And I don't think it's minuscule at all for you to be tying your fish loss to this event - we are all part of the same ecosystem after all.

I am going to guess that you are correct - the shock waves from the explosion killed your fish. I'm not sure the actual physiology of the issue, but we've all heard that you should never pound on the ice on a frozen pond to try to put a hole in it for fear the shock waves will kill the fish - I can only imagine this is the same kind of issue.

Having said that - I wouldn't rule out environmental contamination. There could easily have been air quality issues created by the exploding that weren't necessarily debris but things that you can't see that polluted the pond.

Very very weird! As to how long it will last? Who knows! Hopefully you won't lose many more.

 

[addy1]

Welcome to the forum!

Horrible, those poor people!

I would agree with @Lisak1 , probably the shock waves. Your house rattled, imagine what the fish felt.

 

[Mmathis]

Hello and welcome!

 

[j.w]

@mgrasinger
So sorry for all involved in that catastrophe. I guess we will really only be guessing on if this caused your fish death. Would be interesting tho to know if anyone else around you have ponds and the same thing is happening? And also any fish kills in small lakes or river/streams around you. You could call your local fishery agency and ask. Hoping the rest of your fish will be ok.

 

[Tula]

I read about this explosion, so tragic.

I too agree it was probably shock waves that killed your fish, given the strength of the explosion

 

[GBBUDD]

To know ones surprise I might lean two directions. While explosions can be devastating they are greatly reduced by water and distance. Though sound travels very well across the water and even when sound is generated under water. As sound wave above will not pernitrate water very well.

If the house caught on fire and the rains then fell it would carry the contaminants into the pond. I would suspect contamination and water changes would be high on my list.

That being said I'm not so far from your area and I am betting you too have had a very wet spring and summer as I even got 3 inches in a hour this morning.

The other issue with all the rain is a pH crash. I was worried myself but I found I'm stable at 8.2 and kh around 90.

Have you tested your water?

 

[mgrasinger]

I just wanted to thank everyone for your input and post a quick update on my pond. First, I left out a very important detail on my first post that I wanted to add. It rained cats and dogs the night of the explosion. Honestly, I was in such a state of shock I had completely forgotten that it rained that night until a few days ago. All told, I lost about 40 fish, mainly babies to 2 years old, although I did notice some babies today that survived (so far) and the carnage has seemed to subside. I had my water tested and it was very acidic, so we did a 50% water change, added baking soda to balance the PH and added some additional salt.

My uneducated conclusion is twofold. I can definitely see how the small pond would have experienced a more intense seismic event than the larger pond. I think the larger mass of water in the big pond would have absorbed more shock than the smaller pond. Thus, the fish in the smaller pond were likely more stressed than in the larger pond. The toxins in the air were brought straight down into the ponds the night of the explosion by the rainstorm. The toxins coupled with the stress caused the fish kill. We ended up losing all the fish in the small pond and only about 10 in the larger pond.

Conclusion to anyone that experiences a simple house fire or wildfire nearby and a subsequent rainstorm – don’t wait on that water change. I wish I had realized that sooner!

 

[mrsclem]

Glad to hear things have settled down. So sorry for the loss of your fish. Can I ask why you are adding salt to your pond? Years ago that was part of ponding. Koi and goldfish are fresh water. Salt can be used as a treatment in a quarantine tank but not necessary in a pond.

 

[WaterGardener]

Heavy rain in itself can cause a pH crash, which seems to be what your pond experienced. The rain in your and my areas is acidic, often with a pH of 4!

So there is the chance that the explosion had nothing to do with the fish loss.

You have it stabilized now, but the baking soda buffer will get used up over time, with more rain and just with the nitrogen cycle. That cycle is a continuous process, 24/7, 365 days a year. So the KH (alkalinity to buffer that acid) needs to be monitored and tested for every now and then and boosted when it gets low, under 80-100ppm.

I highly recommend, as others have already said, that you get your own liquid type testing kits, not strips, to test your own water. They are very simple to do and you can prevent this from happening again.

 

[j.w]

@mgrasinger I just put a bag of crushed oyster shells in my pond the other day hoping it will help w/any future ph crashes..............who knows for sure but it can't hurt I hope anyways. We have had recent and past discussions on this subject here w/mixed ideas: https://www.gardenpondforum.com/threads/oyster-shells.32752/#post-515789