Introducing myself, and have a question

[kfboone]

I kind of thought I would wait until I had a question before introducing myself. But I was hoping it wouldn't involve me being away from home and my wife calling about a fecal incident.
The neighbor's daughter was in the pool, a little solid dropped that was removed quickly. There was also a little that entered the pool that was not solid. I do not think she's sick, just young. The matter that couldn't be removed is skimming off the top. (sorry for the detail, but the stuff seems to be floating not sinking) I use the TFT 100 kit and the CYA is about 40 with the last daily chlorine test I performed about 4.0. I run the generator 7 hours a day. My wife doesn't know how to use the TFT 100 kit yet and I'm out of town until Saturday. My thought is that I need to use the calculator to tell her to raise the chlorine to about 20, then backwash a few hours after the added liquid chlorine has had time to spread throughout the pool. Questions are: (1) is this kind of correct? (2)
When to backwash? (3) how long does it take for the raised chlorine level to drop back to safe levels for swimming? and how long overall should swimmers wait?

I hope I have my signature information correct. We are in Raleigh, NC. Sorry if I've left out needed info.

Thanks,
Kirk

 

[pooldv]

Welcome to TFP!

Great first question! Tell her to add 10 ppm of FC, wait 30 min and jump in. This is why we say you must maintain FC above minimum for your CYA to keep your pool sanitary. Because your pool is above minimum FC your bacterial kill rate is sufficient to prevent person to person disease transmission.

It is safe to swim with FC up to shock level for your CYA, [FC/CYA][/FC/CYA]

 

[Pool Tool]

Well this is certainly a crappy situation. Sorry couldn't resist. Honestly, I don't think that a backwash will do anything - maybe help the mind a little but nothing to flush the trouble, again sorry! I would raise the FC to SLAM and run the pump. As for the skimmer basket, remove what you can as soon as you can. Spray some diluted bleach on it and rinse then repeat a few times for good measure. They can swim up to SLAM FC levels, so provided you get the bleach added pretty quickly and let the pump run for a while you should be fine.

Internet is truly amazing; Fecal accidents in swimming pools: no big deal Effect Measure
Looks like the CDC suggests 20 ppm for 8 hours for diarrheal accidents, which sounds like your case. As typical, there is no accompanying CYA level but I think Slam level would kill just about everything.

 

[kfboone]

Great answers. Thanks so much. It doesn't stink as bad as I thought. Lol.

 

[pooldv]

Welcome to TFP!