Are you worried about rain ruining your swimming pool water? You should be. Some people might think that it is just water. There is no need to be concerned about having it fall into your pool, right?
Well, it should cause you a bit more concern if you really know what it can bring to your pool. Now that the summer season is here, you need to be prepared to handle this issue. Although there will be a lot of sunshine, there will be episodes of rainfall as well. You need to prepare your pool for this if you want to keep it safe for your use the whole season.
Rain brings a lot of things into your pool
What you have to understand is that rain can bring a lot of things and issues that you might want to take care of immediately. Of course, we are talking about a significant amount of rainfall. If it is just a drizzle, then you have nothing to worry about. But if you just had heavy rains, then you need to take a look at your swimming pool to clean up the mess that weather just dumped on it.
Let us start with the way the extra water will mess up the chemicals in your pool. Rainwater has acidic properties that can affect the chemical balance in your pool water. Thanks to the industrial gasses in the atmosphere, the rainwater has a lot of acids that can mess up the alkalinity and pH balance of the pool.
You already have to worry about the added water diluting the existing chemicals in your pool. When you add the properties brought by the rain, that can lead to bigger problems. Since the water is falling on everything, you should expect that it will run off and find its way into your pool – at least, if it is in-ground. That means water from the deck and surrounding landscape will bring a lot of other bacteria, algae, and organisms in your pool.
But that is not all, a heavy rainfall usually come with strong winds and that means dirt and debris are mixed into your pool. You have to clean that up.
What to do after it rains on your pool
Once you consider all of these things, you know that your pool needs a lot of work before you can use it again. You need to correct it immediately because once the sun comes out after the rain, the algae that were brought into the pool will reproduce. Leaving it for a few days might make things worse. Not only that, the messed up chemicals in the water can damage the metal and plaster that is used within and around the swimming pool.
The first thing that you should do is to check the level of water. Since it rained, there is probably more water in the pool – at least, more than it should have. You need to drain it to ensure that it is appropriate for skimming.
When you are done with the water, you need to remove any debris floating on the surface or anything that sunk below. These can also mess up with the chemicals in the water so it is best to get rid of these before adding the chemicals that will clean your pool water.
After that, you can work on correcting the chemical levels in your pool. There is no need to replace the water. You just have to make sure that it has the right chemicals that will keep it clean. There is a test that you can do to determine how much you should replace.
It also helps to shock the pool to get rid of the algae that were brought in by the rain. Using algicide can help with this. What is great about it is that it does not decompose when mixed with chlorine. The same is true when it is exposed to sunlight.
How to protect your pool water from the rain
While it is good to know what you should do after it rains, it is better to put some protective measures. Protect the water so you do not have to worry about the clean up right after.
First of all, you can cover the pool to ensure that no debris or leaves will fall into the water. You cannot do anything about the water that could run off from the surrounding landscape but you can minimize it.
In case you are expecting several episodes of rain, it helps to have an outlet valve for your cartridge filters. This will help pump excess water to keep it down to the right skimmer level. Just make sure it will never go below this level so it will not leave the pump dry.
If the weather reports a strong rainfall that is accompanied by winds, you might want to secure the furniture outside. Make sure none of them are loose or will fall over when a strong gust of wind passes by.
These are simple things that you can do to ensure that your pool is protected from the rain. At the very least, it will minimize what you have to clean up after the sun decides to come out – allowing you to immediately enjoy the pool water.
