Written by Sharon Casselman
I must admit I was a pool rat. Growing up I spent every day at the pool, rain or shine it didn’t matter. After a full day of swimming, my mom would say, “well you sure don’t need a bath tonight!” Many years later, I hate to say it but mom was mistaken, and I lived to tell about it!
It’s a delicate topic, and nobody wants to talk about it, but it happens. Your child may have been the one who just couldn’t make it to the bathroom in time, worse yet, some of you may have seen it but didn’t say anything. It’s one of the not-so-glamorous things the aquatic staff has to deal with. The only thing the staff cares about is if it’s solid! Because, if it’s not, the pool is required to close for at least thirteen hours! More on that later….
So what do we do when it happens? The pool is cleared immediately, and it is removed and disposed of in a sanitary manner. The chorine should be raise to 2 parts per million (ppm), we generally keep our chlorine at 2 ppm, so, as an added precaution, we raise the chlorine to 3 ppm and “spot” treat the area with granular chlorine. Ph must be maintained at 7.5 or less, and the temperature at 77 degrees or higher. Our Ph is regularly maintained at 7.2-7.4 and the temperature at 78 degrees or warmer. We maintain these levels for at least 60 minutes before reopening the pool. These procedures exceed those required by Health Department and The Center for Disease Control.
So what about diarrhea? We pray it doesn’t happen but unfortunately it could. In a nutshell, we would clear the pool immediately and remove as much of it as possible. The chlorine must be raised to 20 ppm, the Ph must be maintained at Ph of 7.5 or less and a temperature of 77 degrees or higher for at least 13 hours. Next is a thorough backwash (cleaning of the filters). When the chemical ranges are back to normal, then, and only then, could we re-open.
This might be a little more information than you wanted, but now you can rest assured we do everything in our power to keep you safe while swimming in our pool.
Heaven knows the summer is filled with all kinds of potential dangers, exploding firecrackers, poison ivy, and sunburns. We do not need to dodge doo-doo in the pool!
From one pool rat to another, here’s wishing the rest of your summer is fun, chlorine-filled, and doo-doo free!
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