went home for lunch today and everything looks fine.
Yes, just pumped the old water back in. Simply had a 42gal and 32gal bute trash cans, and took out all the water until there was about 3" above the sand. Two hoses were used; an 1" ID hose, and then used another hose for drain, and pump - 3/4". This was a two person operation. My wife held the 1" tube low in the tank, while I used the 3/4". First, return pump and power heads turned off, all corals from the sand bed were removed and placed in my frag area downstairs. I'd imagine one could just use a 5 gal bucket for this temp placement of coral. So pumps were shut off with iPad (Apex), than I started one syphon, then the other. The 3/4 hose was about half way down and with both tubes draining the tank really fast (literally 3 min tops). About half way drained, I stopped the 3/4, and hooked the pump on to it and put it inside one of the brute cans. Then took my net and went to the other side. For those who don't know my setup, it's viewable from both sides built into a wall with rock and coral in the middle. I ensured to have the fish stay on the side we were not on, and used a net to scare him once, but as mentioned the water draining was really fast. With 3" of water, catching the fish was rather easy, took two tries, literaly a min. I ran downstairs and put him in the QT setup which is a 39Gal cube. Went upstairs and the MAG9 pump make quick work at getting the water back into the tank.
Obviously the corals were all slimed up but after a few hours (and skimmer going crazy) everything was back to normal.
