Chlorine Leak
This entry was posted on 7/3/2006 12:11 PM and is filed under Emergencies,1987-1997.
Dear Fellow Former Beach Staffers,
One evening in the late 80's while doing routine closing of the Beach I opened the hatch to the "pit" at the East end of the Beach & a spray of water was coming from just past the newly installed chlorine injector. Not knowing what was going on I started climbing down the ladder when I was overwhelmed by chlorine fumes. I grabbed on to the ladder & climbed back up, ran to the office to call Jim Ensign. Dick Perry was in Hawaii on a family vacation, during that 2 weeks we had 14 emergencies as well as this chlorine leak. The liquid chlorine had eaten through the outlet pipe and was filling up the "pit." We called the city water department & it was decided to let the pit flood, don scuba gear and attach a collar to the leaking pipe. The leak was contained by around midnight. Jim & I checked the chlorine level of the water, being low we got into a row boat and began broadcasting chlorine pellets by hand into the entire facility. We finished & headed home by around 2 am. We were able to open up the next day and kept the chlorine level within normal limits.
That summer was my last as assistant manager & when Dick threatened to go on another short family vacation later that summer I threatened to resign on the spot. We rarely had emergencies when he was there but when I was in charge every kid in Naperville lost his Mom & an emergency was called.
I am competing in a golf tournament on Saturday the 8th & hope to get over to the beach as soon as they award me the trophy. Hope to see many of you there.
Bill Hughes, 88-89 I think?
