Neighbor kid poop'd in my pool!

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Ababysean

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Jun 2, 2010
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I have an above ground 18*48 intex metal frame pool. I have a full sized sand filter instead of the fish tank pump that came with it.

What do I do?

I'm about to throw a gallon of liquid chlorine in the pool to super shock it but should I just drain all the water out and start new? I really do NOT want to but I don't want to catch nasty poop germs either! haha

Thanks in advance
 
I have no idea if it was solid or not. I did not look, it was not in the pool, he just ran to the bathroom and then his mom came and apologized.... There was no floater, so I'm assuming it was either in his shorts or it was not solid.....gah
 
What you need to look out for is Cryptosporidium. It is highly resistant to chlorine.

The CDC recomends

(http://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/pdf/swi ... ridium.pdf)

15,300 Contact Time of chlorine to kill Crypto.

That is FC X Minutes = 15,300

In the example they provide, FC of 20ppm would require 765 minutes (12.75 hours).

Here's the bad news: This chlorine level is in unstabalized water.

A footnote in the link states:
This level of Crypto inactivation cannot be reached in the presence of 50 ppm chlorine stabilizer, even after 24 hours at 40 ppm free chlorine, pH 6.5, and a temperature of 77°F (25°C). Extrapolation of these data suggest it would take approximately 30 hours to kill 99.9% of Crypto in the presence of 50 ppm or less cyanuric acid, 40 ppm free chlorine, pH 6.5, and a temperature of 77°F (25°C) or higher.

And, the presense of this bacteria is not going to register as a FC drop. (First, the FC may not be killing it, and if it is, there isn't really enough to register).

On the other hand... some public pools and water parks have several POUNDS of fecal matter deposited on a daily basis just from inproper cleaning. This is a great reason to have our own pools.

Being you know the source of the exposure, I would just make sure the kid isn't sick, and go back to swimming after a really good 24 hour shock.
 

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The odds for Crypto are low. If it was a formed stool, then it's possible to have Giardia, but unlikely to have Crypto. If it was diarrhea, then Crypto is possible but not likely. In a public pool where one person can infect thousands, they can't take a chance whenever there is a diarrhea incident.

If in this case there is actually Crypto, then with CYA in the water it's going to be very hard to get rid of, essentially requiring the FC to be 10 ppm higher than the CYA level (which is roughly equivalent to 10 ppm FC with no CYA) for at least 25-1/2 hours for a 99% kill. That is an extraordinarily high level of chlorine that isn't practical in most residential pools.
 
Chem Geek:
Assuming it was crypto, and the person's CYA was 50, what level of shock chlorination do you suggest and for how long?

I found a dark blob at the bottom of my shallow end this morning (after lots of little kids using the pool yesterday)....I've never seen anything like it before; brushed it and it instantly dissolved. I'm suspicious it was poop, but then again since it was in a loose clump at the bottom of the pool it was probably not originally diarrhea.

Thoughts?

Thanks!
 
According to the CDC, a formed stool is fairly unlikely to contain Crypto though may contain Giardia. Crypto is usually released with diarrhea.

It will be impractical to superchlorinate your pool against Crypto when the CYA is 50 ppm. You'd have to elevate the FC to around 60 ppm held for 25 hours. I seriously doubt that the child had Crypto, but if you really want to decontaminate against it then with the high CYA level I think it's easiest to disinfect with chlorine dioxide as described in this post where you would add roughly 2 ounces weight of sodium chlorite anhydrous per 10,000 gallons (about 3.2 ounces weight sodium chlorite trihydrate per 10,000 gallons) with the pool having around 4-5 ppm FC.
 
I agree it's probably not infected with crypto since it must have originally been formed and then sank to the bottom and disintegrated overnight (ewwww). Problem is, I couldn't remove it, so it became part of my 21,000 gallons (even more ewwww). I didn't get up in time to check my chlorine before the sun came up, but as of 1pm today my chlorine dropped from 24ppm last night after dark to 15ppm. I'm going to raise it back up to 24ppm, the suggested shock level for a CYA of 60, and check it in the morning before sun up.

Do you think it's the sun that's eating up that much FC, or possibly the disintegrated poo?

Thanks for the baby ruth imagery. :lol:
 
Probably both. The sun will cut down the 24 ppm FC, but probably not to 15 ppm by 1 PM with your CYA of 60 ppm. You'll know for sure when you do check the chlorine loss overnight. When that loss is <= 1 ppm and when CC <= 0.5 ppm you can then lower the FC from the shock level to your usual level. The particulate part of the fecal matter will get filtered out from the pool and any bacteria in it have already been killed.
 
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