There are some boundaries house guests should respect.

If you were at a friend’s house and there was water leaking from the ceiling, would you let your friend handle the situation or take matters into your own hands?

This woman was worried about a leak causing a disaster while staying at her friend’s place. So she turned off the electricity.

Suffice it to say, she tried to prevent one disaster but caused another.

Check out the full story below for all the details.

AITA for turning off the main switch in an apartment I was a guest in?

A friend in our gaming group hosted us for Rosh Hashanah.

He’s a fantastic host, always funny, very welcoming, and hospitable. When at his place, we usually play Scrabble and other word games.

Let’s call him Atlas. He’s observant, while the rest of us are secular, so a family member and I arrived before the holiday and stayed over.

This is a big problem!

The morning after Rosh Hashanah eve, Atlas noticed water on the main bathroom floor and asked if anyone knew what had happened.

I said no, we were using the guest bathroom.

A bit later, we heard dripping, and when he checked, water was literally streaming from the ceiling. He suspected it was either the AC or a leak from the upstairs neighbors (we were on the 29th floor, so there was one flat above).

The men took turns climbing up on the (pretty wet and slippery) bathroom counter, removing ceiling panels, peeking inside touching the various pipes and trying to spot the problem.

She tried to explain her concern.

At this point I was freaking out because:

*The ceiling (drywall) was soaked and could collapse

*Water and electricity together = real electrocution risk

I told Atlas we should switch off the AC or call building management. I even said this was basically pikuach nefesh (danger to life) at this point, so halachically it should be fine to turn the AC off.

This woman turned off the main switch while the host was working on the leak.

Instead of listening, the host told me I was overreacting, being “hysterical,” and that I should let the men handle it.

I left the bathroom to look for the AC remote. It’s a ducted AC system.

I couldn’t find it, but what I did find is the fuse box. There was no explanation written above the fuses, so i just flipped the main one.

But it meant no electricity for two days during the holiday.

The flooding stopped, we cleaned up the mess and continued playing.

Our host was gracious about the whole thing, but told me what I did it was unnecessary, as they were handling it.

Also, him being observant meant we couldn’t turn the switch back on so the food in the refrigerators would spoil.

He could only switch it back on in the next evening (rosh ha-shannah is two days) and meanwhile we won’t have electricity in the evening as the timer switch won’t be operational.

She doesn’t know if she overstepped.

So evening came and we played by candlelight.

You can’t light a candle, but you can pass the light. He had a 24-hour one and we just used that one to light other candles.

Our pre-electricity ancestors have my sympathy, I don’t know how humanity managed before electricity.

Candlelight does add ambivalence but is completely unfit for playing board games.

He joked about us playing in darkness in good spirit and he was really gracious about the whole thing, but I still feel I might have overstepped taking the switch into my own hands in an apartment that doesn’t belong to me.

So, AITA ?

Crisis averted, but at what cost?

Here’s what other people have to say about this on Reddit.

Keep your hands to yourself, says this person.

This person thinks she was wrong.

On the contrary, this person agrees with her.

And lastly, here’s a valid perspective.

Always choose safety over convenience.

If you thought that was an interesting story, check out what happened when a family gave their in-laws a free place to stay in exchange for babysitting, but things changed when they don’t hold up their end of the bargain.