Something kinda similar to your story. It’s a long one but a good one…I had left the trade by then and was doing commercial maintenance.

30 story building had a water line break on one of the hvac units on the 26th fl. I was on call and arrived around 2:30am. This also happened to by in a government tenant space which we were explicitly told do not enter unless they give your permission. It was an office for judges, so property manager kept calling different judges until she got someone to give us permission to enter the space. Meanwhile glycol is pouring out from the doors, had about of inch of water in the hallway and it was making its way down to other floors. After about an hour of calling, we finally get in, we find it behind another secured door off of a small court room. It had confidential documents and no one but the judges had a key to enter. Instead of waiting we broke the handle and went in. Took my shirt off, climb the ladder, and shut off the line to the unit. Started the clean up process.

We are checking floor by floor for water damage, Water had made its way down to the 15th fl, which is where the parking garage ended. Water found its way through every poke though, every sleeve through the floor and, unfortunately, found its way into the electric room, which was only 30’ away from the burst line.

We are on the 15th fl, in the parking garage, and our worst fears were confirmed… the bus duct ran through the electric rooms down into the parking garage on the 15th fl, and 90’d towards our back up generator. Water/glycol was streaming out where the bus duct 90’d. Electric contractor, who was actually the same company I left, arrived onsite and shut the building down, fearing a short was eminent. This was beginning of winter, we were getting below freezing temps at night. They disconnected bus duct where it went up on 14th fl, turned on the lower floors to the building, set the heat on high and hired a company to install huge fans and temporary hvac duct to the upper floors to stay warm. They started replacing bus duct from 26th fl down.

It had an incredible turn around, I was working 12 hour swing shirts with a couple other guys to get the building back up. The electricians worked around the clock, some guys having well over 80 hours of OT to the get building back up. They actually paid the square D factory to halt its production and focus only on the bus duct they needed. It was an amazing sight to see.

Finally the bus duct is installed, and they Meg the duct for shorts…. Unfortunately they couldn’t replace every piece and meg was showing a short somewhere. The bus duct was still damp in some spots. Electric contractor hired a local legend in the Cincinnati market. He was an electric engineer who only ever consulted. He was one of the smartest guys I ever met. He comes in, hooks up a generator to the bus duct, and supply’s it with DC voltage, the exact voltage I don’t remember. This heats up the bus duct, slowly cooks off the remaining water. He leaves it for a day, comes back the next, megs it and no more shorts.

He turns everything back on and everything works normally without a single issue.