Ultimate Guide to Taking Care of Your Pool Before and After Heavy Rainfall

You can’t just ignore a rainstorm, thunderstorm, or hail! After the rain stops, it’s important to balance your pool’s water chemistry because chloramines are now present. The chloramines linger in the water on our skin and hair for quite some time if we continuously swim without showering between these activities. Suppose you live in a …

You can’t just ignore a rainstorm, thunderstorm, or hail!

After the rain stops, it’s important to balance your pool’s water chemistry because chloramines are now present. The chloramines linger in the water on our skin and hair for quite some time if we continuously swim without showering between these activities.

Suppose you live in a region prone to experiencing frequent storms, summer tornadoes, and winter freezing temperatures. In that case, there is no other way around it – you need to take the fundamental precautions so that you don’t get a musty smell in your pool! 

To maintain your swimming pool healthy, you must prepare before the storm and do some maintenance after the rain subsides. This article will discuss how to take care of your pool before and after heavy rainfall. This will keep your pool clean, healthy, and ready to use.

aking Care of Your Pool Before and After Heavy Rainfall

What to Do With Your Pool Before and After Heavy Rainfall?

Pool Precautions Before Rainfall

Rainy days are around the corner, which means it’s also time for the inevitable rainstorm. What will you do to prepare? Do you have that perfect gate to keep your pool dry? Maybe a new cover to help protect your pool when it’s not in use?

If you know there’s bad weather coming, it’s time to prepare your pool. By following these basic steps, you can assure that water will be easily removed and drained if it does get its way into your pool.

Vacuum Your Pool

Thoroughly vacuum your pool and remove as much debris as possible. This will decrease the amount of rainwater that will enter your pool. You should also use a pool brush or net to get rid of leaves and other items in the water. 

Vacuum Your Pool

Seal Open Groundings the Day Before a Storm

We recommend sealing open groundings to prevent debris and flooding from entering the pool the day before a storm.

Rain or shine, it’s important to maintain your pool and take the necessary precautions to protect it against storm damages. You don’t want pools with a musty smell lingering around for your neighbors to enjoy too!

Protect Your Pool From Outside Elements

Protect your pool deck and other structures by keeping them away from landscaping that has wooden structures. You should also be careful to place plants, flowers, or bushes around the pool that strong winds or high waves would affect.

The rainy season is associated with mosquitoes, and mosquitos need water to grow – So you should invest in a mosquito net for your pool if possible because this will discourage mosquitoes from even bothering to visit your pool area!

Lower the Pool Water By up to One Foot Before a Heavy Storm

Most pools include a mechanism for overflowing water. You may bring the water level down up to one foot before the big storm if you want to be extra cautious.

But don’t reduce it to more than that. Hydrostatic pressure will exert pressure on the bottom of the swimming pool. To offset the pressure, it is essential to maintain sufficient weight from the pool water.

Heavy rain can introduce plenty of organic debris and algae into your swimming pool. Ideally, the time to deal with the mess caused by the heavy rain is after the storm has passed. However, it’s also a good idea to pretreat your pool water before raining.

Make Sure Any Drainage Is Not Clogged

If there is heavy rain predicted for your area, it might be a good idea to get the gutters cleared and cleaned out and make sure there are no obstacles on the properties around your house. It’s also important to have sloped surfaces that ensure water will be drawn away from your home and not towards it.

Make Sure Any Drainage Is Not Clogged

How to Clean Your Swimming Pool After Rainfall

Learn how to clean your swimming pool after a rain so you can get back to summertime fun.

Everybody loves a good dip in the pool, but nobody wants to feel icky and sticky when they come out. Chlorine-free water is great for your health and leaves you feeling refreshed, dry and ready for another swim. But before jumping in, it’s important to make sure the pool has been adequately cleaned after recent rainwater inflow – as this can be a breeding ground for bacteria that causes people to get sick.

Keep reading. We’ll guide you through the proper steps involved with cleaning a swimming pool after raining – from vacuuming with care, sealing leaks, and draining dirty water from the bottom of the pool.

Check Your Water Level

The first thing you should look after a storm is checking your pool’s water level. Note whether the water level has risen. 

There’s a huge chance that your water level is way beyond where it should be. If that’s the case, then everything from filtration to water chemistry gets affected. 

Here, let us show how you can drain water in your pool after it rains:

  • Adjust your pump system to “Waste” or “Backwash.”
  • Put in your backwash hose
  • Switch on the pool pump

Make sure you watch your water level while your pump empties water. (Don’t switch off the pump until your water is at mid-skimmer level)

Switch on the Filter

Now that your water level is back to its usual level, it’s time to get your water correctly circulating. 

Take note: Before restarting your pump, remove excesses from the pump and pool skimmer baskets. Then, set your pump to FILTER.

Start the pump while moving on to the next step. Your main drain will help to clean while you’re working.

Find out about the importance of a clean pool filter and what you should do to maintain it.

Brush, Vacuum, and Skim the Pool

Removing debris from the pool using a leaf rake relieves stress on the filtration system, and brushing dirt loosens it for simpler filtering. Brushing also keeps pool surfaces free of algae and debris.

One way to brush and skim the pool is to start from one side of the pool with your pool brush and gently scrub all along one wall of the pool. Rinse out the dirty water with the hose (if you have a floating hose holder) and continue brushing until you get back to where you started. Rinse out your brush, then start on different sides of the pool’s wall until it’s wholly brushed clean.

If there’s still dirt and sediment left behind at the bottom of the pool, you can use the appropriate vacuum equipment for your pool surface. 

When vacuuming your pool, make sure you have a lot of suction and don’t damage your plants or flower beds with the included parts that need rotating to suck up debris. The bigger the vacuum, the more it efficiently works at removing organic debris such as leaves and other organic debris from the surface of your swimming pool.

Shock Your Pool

Even though you call it “shocking your pool”, it has nothing to do with electricity or the revelation of something. 

Shocking your pool is a process of adding and balancing chemicals to your pool water for such reasons including:

  • removing chloramines, or known as mixed chlorine
  • increasing your chlorine level rapidly
  • destroying contaminants such as algae, bacteria, and harmful pathogens. 

Chlorine-free water is excellent for your health and leaves you feeling refreshed, dry and ready for another swim.

Shock Your Pool

What’s the ideal time to shock your pool?

The best time to shock your pool is in the evening because sunlight will not be boiling the chlorine out of your pool. And because shocking increases the chlorine level up, this can hurt the skin. So it’s best to shock your pool when there is no one else that will disturb the water or use it for fun activities like swimming.

Check and Measure the pH and Alkalinity Levels

Keep in mind that when it starts to rain, the pH levels in your pool will change. The pH level of your swimming pool’s water is used to indicate how harsh the chemicals are, which can affect our health. 

The natural balance in water drops ranges from 5.5-8. Still, after one day of heavy rainfall, the pH levels may drop to around seven or more because of the quantity of acid dissolved into the water due to water saturation. It’s best not to shock your pool if it rains heavily because you want your chlorine levels at their highest and not mixed with other acids like those found on earth from rainfall or even animals.

Check and Measure the pH and Alkalinity Levels

Here’s how you can counter the effects of rainwater in your pool:

  • Measure pH level: Quality pool standards should range between 7.4-7.6 pH
  • Measure Alkalinity: 80-120 ppm is the perfect TA
  • Measure Calcium Hardness: A good CH level ranges from 100-300 ppm

Does your swimming pool turn to color green after the downfall?

Algae cause the pool water to become green. Hot weather allows algae to develop quickly, especially in summer, which why it may surprise you overnight. This is often due to the reduction or imbalance level of chlorine in the water.

Here’s how you can adjust your pool chemicals. 

  • Adjust Ph level

To increase the pool’s pH level: You can use soda ash/ sodium carbonate

To decrease the pool’s pH level: You can use sodium bisulphate or muriatic acid

  • Adjust Alkalinity level

To increase the pool’s Total Alkalinity level: You can use baking soda

To decrease the pool’s Total Alkalinity level: You can use muriatic acid

  • Adjust Calcium Hardness Level

To increase the pool’s Calcium Hardness level: You can add calcium chloride

To decrease the pool’s Calcium Hardness level: Add more water

What is the healthy state of pool water?

Pool water should be free of contaminants and have a pH level in-between 7.4-7.6 pH, Total Alkalinity between 80-120 ppm, and Calcium Hardness between 100-300 ppm. That’s because 7.5 is the pH level of any sensitive part of your body, like your eyes, nose, and ears.

By keeping the pH level of your pool close to the natural levels of the human body, you avoid the risk of irritation. When the pool’s water level increases more than 7.5 pH, you will find that the pool water will leave you with red, itchy eyes and dry skin. Your swim trunks may also start to bleach out and affect the part of the pool itself. 

Is it safe to swim in the pool after rain?

The risk of getting hurt while swimming in a pool is too high and not worth it. It would be best to always be cautious of the water you swim in and decide whether or not to keep going because of the possible contamination. 

Find out about the top 10 best pool chemical testing kits.

Conclusion

It’s important to be proactive about your pool’s water quality, but don’t worry—if you have a common rainfall, your pool should be fine since your pool’s skimmers and drains are designed to remove the excess water. 

Hopefully, we’ve given all the information that you need to know when a storm is approaching and the maintenance necessary after the storm. 

If you do not have the confidence, courage, time, or space to look after your swimming pool, you’re better off looking into hiring a professional. 

Apart from these services, you may also find that the company repairs any malfunctions in your pool equipment. They can provide advice for pool safety and maintenance too!

Get ideas for your own backyard oasis by browsing swimming pool designs.

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About the author

Brian Anderson

The rather dry pool world out there is in need of some passion to make it shine. With the help of my son Ruben and his wife Maria our mission is to help you create the favorite spot of your house - your pool.

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