A burst pipe can cause a lot ot damage to your home and contents. There are a number of steps you can take to reduce the amount of damage, these are:
- Switch off any water heaters or boilers and put out any fires in solid fuel heating.
- turn off the mains stopcock - this stops any more water coming into the house
- If the leak is from pipe which is fed either by the hot water tank or the cold water tank in the loft then turn on the taps as this will help drain the water faster.
- Get buckets etc to catch as much water as possible water coming out
- deal with any flood water and damage
If there is damage to carpets and possessions then you will probably be covered by your home insurance. You should contact them as soon as possible to find out how they want to deal with your claim and what evidence they need. iT may be worth taking pictures of the damage.
Contact a plumber to get repairs made, or if you have a home emergency product such as Direct Line's HR24 [more] and they will deal with everything for you.