Turning Off Your Water in an Emergency: A Step-by-Step Guide

The single most useful thing you can do during a burst pipe or major leak is turn off the water supply. How fast you manage that depends entirely on whether you already know where your stopcock is. Finding it for the first time while water spreads across your kitchen floor costs precious minutes. However, finding it now, before anything goes wrong, costs nothing.

Find your stopcock now, not during an emergency

The internal stopcock (sometimes called a stop tap) controls the mains water supply into your property. In most homes it's located:

• Under the kitchen sink, often in the cupboard behind the pipework
• In a downstairs toilet or utility room
• Under the stairs, where the supply pipe first enters the building
• In an airing cupboard, on older properties with the tank in that location

On Portsmouth's Victorian terraces in areas like Fratton and Copnor, the stopcock often sits lower and further back in the sink cupboard than in a modern build. Take a torch and look properly before assuming it isn't there. Flats and converted properties can also have a shared external stopcock for the building, as well as an internal one for the flat itself. Since it's not always clear which applies to you, check both to be sure.

There's usually an external stopcock too, in a small chamber under a metal cover near the boundary of your property or in the pavement outside. This one is the water company's responsibility, not yours. However, it's worth knowing it exists as a backup if the internal one is stuck or you can't locate it.

How to turn it off

1. **Locate the stopcock** using the guide above.
2. **Turn it clockwise** ("righty-tighty") to close it. Most stopcocks are a wheel-shaped valve; older ones can be stiff if they haven't been used in years.
3. **Turn it fully** until it stops moving. A stopcock that's only partly closed will still let water through.
4. **Run a tap** (the lowest one in the house, if possible) to drain remaining water from the pipes and relieve pressure.
5. **If it won't turn**, don't force it hard enough to damage the valve. Move to the external stopcock if you can access it safely, and call for help.

Test it before you need it

A stopcock nobody has touched in years can seize up. The worst time to discover that is mid-emergency. Once a year or so, turn yours off and back on again to keep it moving freely. If it's stiff, corroded, or won't turn at all, get it looked at and replaced, since a working stopcock is one of the cheapest pieces of insurance in your home.

What to do after the water is off

Turning off the stopcock stops things getting worse. However, it doesn't fix the underlying problem. Once the immediate danger is contained, here's what to do next:

• Open a low tap to drain the remaining water from the system
• Switch off electrics near any standing water at the consumer unit, if you can do so safely
• Take photos of the damage for insurance purposes
• Get the burst pipe itself repaired properly rather than leaving the water off indefinitely — a house with no water supply has its own problems

Sometimes the leak is hidden rather than an obvious burst — a persistently high water bill, or a damp patch with no clear source. That's a different situation, better suited to leak detection than an emergency stopcock shutoff. Since there's no active flood to stop, it doesn't need the same urgency.

Coverage across Portsmouth and the surrounding area

Our emergency plumbers cover call-outs across Portsmouth, Gosport, Fareham, Havant and the wider area, 24/7, with no call-out fee. If you've already turned off your stopcock, the next step is getting the pipe repaired. Since that's exactly what we do, get in touch and we'll take it from there.