What to Do When a Pipe Bursts

By Austin Emergency Plumbing Pros · Updated September 2026

Stop the Water Before Anything Else

A split supply line keeps producing water at mains pressure until a valve closes. Everything else can wait. If the leak is under a sink or behind a toilet, the small stop valve on the wall may close it in seconds. If it is inside a wall, a ceiling or somewhere you cannot see, go to the main.

On most Austin properties the main shutoff is the valve inside the water meter box set into the ground near the curb, under a rectangular lid. Many houses also have a valve where the supply enters the building, often near an outdoor faucet. Both are worth locating on a quiet afternoon, because hunting for a meter lid in the dark with water pouring through a ceiling is not the time to learn where it is.

One rule: do not force a valve that will not turn. A seized stop that snaps off turns a contained leak into an open pipe you have no way of closing.

Treat Water Near Electricity as Dangerous

Water reaching outlets, a breaker panel, an appliance or a light fitting is the part of this that can hurt someone. Do not walk into standing water in a room where outlets are at floor level or where water is running down a wall with a switch on it.

If the breaker panel is somewhere dry and you can reach it safely, switching off the circuits in the affected area is a reasonable step. If you have to cross water to get there, do not. Keep children and pets out of the area entirely and wait. No amount of water damage is worth a shock.

Limit the Damage While You Wait

Once the water is off, the useful work is drainage and protection. Open the lowest faucet in the house to drain what is still sitting in the pipes, which reduces what continues to run out of the break.

Move what you can: rugs, boxes, anything on the floor that absorbs water. Lift furniture legs onto blocks or foil so they do not stain the floor. Towels and a mop are worth using on hard floors, but do not start pulling up flooring or cutting drywall to find the leak. Photograph the damage as you go if there is any chance of an insurance claim, because the pictures are easier to take now than to recreate later.

What Not to Do

Do not tape or clamp a pressurized line and turn the water back on to see if it holds. Do not run a heat source at a frozen pipe with an open flame. Do not open a water heater or touch a gas control unless you are certain which one serves the unit and can reach it safely. And do not keep cycling the water on to check progress. Every cycle puts more water into the structure.

What the Plumber Needs to Know

When you call, have four things ready: where the water is coming from, what you have already shut off, whether the ceiling below is involved, and whether anything electrical has been wet. Those four answers decide how urgent the call is and what the plumber arrives prepared to do.

Add anything unusual that happened just before. A hard freeze overnight, a pressure surge, work done recently in that part of the house, or a pipe that has leaked there before all narrow the search. It is also worth saying what the house is: age, one floor or two, slab or pier-and-beam if you know.

Why Pipes Burst Here

Austin does not freeze often, which is precisely the problem. Supply lines run through attics above the insulation, along uninsulated garage walls and out to hose bibbs that nobody covers, and in a normal winter they get away with it. In February 2021 they did not, and a great many houses across the city lost lines in exactly those places.

Freezing is not the only cause. Older central Austin homes still have original galvanized supply lines that corrode from the inside until a seam gives way, and high water pressure or a failed pressure regulator will find the weakest fitting in any house, of any age.

Getting Help Across the Austin Area

Give the full address when you call. Travis County covers a lot of ground and access varies enormously: a hillside property with a long driveway is planned differently from a central Austin bungalow on a narrow street, and an apartment or condo on a shared stack may need building access arranged first.

Coverage runs out to the surrounding towns as well, including emergency plumbing in Round Rock, and every area is listed on the service areas page.

Arrange an Inspection

Once the immediate leak is stopped, the question becomes how much of that line needs replacing. Independent plumbers handle burst pipe repair, and if the meter is still turning after the visible break is fixed, the next step is leak detection. A freeze that split a pipe often damages the water heater connections too, so it is worth reading water heater repair versus replacement before agreeing to a new unit. You can also call for service and describe what happened.