Where’d the Water Go?

You may remember back in March I discovered a failure in my pool cover system. At the time I figured ice or the fallen blocks (though they had not fallen through the cover) had cut a hole in the cover and pumping all the water off the top would actually pump water out of the pool. It was the only explanation I had for how low into the pool the cover had gone.

So I left the water there throughout the spring (usually I religiously pump it off). The frogs came and laid thousands of eggs. The rains and winds filled the rest with other muck.

Needless to say I wasn’t looking forward to cleaning up all the mess when it came time to opening it.

Once I finally got up the nerve to kill all the tadpoles, I started pumping off the water (luckily the pump did most of the killing for me). As the water cleared away, I noticed an interesting thing. There didn’t appear to be any cuts in the cover. The cover appeared in tact. Moreover, the cover appeared to be lower in the pool then it was back in March. Pulling it aside, I saw the water underneath was also clear and free from cover contamination.

So what the hell happened? In my uber sleep deprived state did I confuse the pool cover accident with something that never was?

The more I worked with it – cleaning up the various cover parts, the more I noticed something seriously wrong. The water level was super low. Way lower than I put it back in the fall when I closed it. Typically I lower the water to about six inches below the skimmer. This is like two feet below the skimmer. This is way below the jets whose pipes I have to insure have no water and plug the openings under water. Here’s the jets now.

So in March I was right the water was lower in the pool, but it’s for a different reason. What reason that is, I haven’t a clue. My guess so far is the clogged bottom drain line has a hole in it. Maybe the weight of the ice and snow on top of the cover pushed the water down the drain and up through the pipe to the hole and out into the ground? I really have no idea. It’s so bizarre. The water I filled yesterday in nine hours was still there this morning, so it’s not an active or aggressive leak. Maybe my bottom drain won’t be clogged anymore?

Just more fun with a used twenty year old pool.

– b