Congress Approves Swimming Pool Drain Safety Bill

By | December 20, 2007

  • December 20, 2007 at 12:45 pm
    Rosie says:
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    if the Supreme Court hadn’t intervened and stolen the 2000 election from Al Gore. Now our children suffer daily. Is there no end to the suffering the next generation must endure in order to fatten Dick Cheney’s wallet?

  • December 20, 2007 at 12:54 pm
    AzAz says:
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    Wow… and to think – only 20 years have gone by – This isn’t the first incident and it took this one 6 year old to get them to act?

    Alarming statistics from one website below titled “Needless drain can lead to swimming pool drowning accidents”

    Since the 1980’s there have been at least 147 incidents documented of suction entrapment in swimming pools, including 36 deaths. Suction entrapment occurs when a swimmer, usually a small child, is trapped by the suction forces created by the water rushing out of the drain at the bottom of the pool. In some cases swimmers have been trapped underwater until they drowned and in others they have suffered serious injuries to various parts of their bodies.

    Hair entrapment in whirlpool/hot tubs is also a real danger and has lead to the drowning death of many who were not able to be extracted in time – No emergency shut off – no emergency drain – What do they have to do – put a pair of scissors in a glass cabinet “In Case of Emergency”?

    Glad they are doing something about futures – now the question is will they enforce or grandfather in the drains that already exist that pose this problem?

  • December 20, 2007 at 1:13 am
    Jimmy says:
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    Rosie: That is such a ridiculous posting it doesn’t even deserve to be read or commented on.

    Earth to Rosie, come back to reality.

  • December 20, 2007 at 1:15 am
    AzAz says:
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    I think she’s on the Al Gore kick with the rising oceans and global warming – you know – oceans… swimming pools… easy to get the two mixed up – they both have water in them LOL

  • December 20, 2007 at 1:21 am
    Dread says:
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    In addition to the design of the drain iteself, there will always be the negligent maintenance component that won’t change. There is no excuse for a missing drain cover. Unless I’m mistaken, most, if not all of these incidents involved a drain with a broken or missing cover. From a physiology stanpoint, how does a 6 hear old end up sitting on a drain in the first place.

  • December 20, 2007 at 1:27 am
    Welcome back Rosie! says:
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    Didja notice that nothing was done until some politician’s granddaughter was involved. These things were happening long before that. Go figure.

  • December 20, 2007 at 1:44 am
    Ohioan says:
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    Instead making this a federal issue, here’s a novel approach. Parents should tell their children…….”DON’T SIT ON OR PUT YOUR LIMBS NEAR A FREAKIN’ POOL DRAIN.” It would go into effect immediately and won’t cost the taxpayers a dime.

  • December 20, 2007 at 1:53 am
    arrgghh says:
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    What’s the big deal here anyway? If there have been 36 deaths over the past twenty years and our population is about 300 million, then the odds are so close to zero of this happening that it is total insanity to waste time, effort, money, etc on doing anything about it. Life has risks. People die. Get over it.

  • December 20, 2007 at 2:13 am
    Wondering... says:
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    Have you ever wondered how we all grew up in such a dangerous world with the common sense rules we had to follow? Were there less attorneys? Maybe we could get together and purchase a bunch of tickets to a pool party for them.

  • December 20, 2007 at 2:38 am
    Becky says:
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    I agree with you. Where are the parents while these children are stuck on the bottom of the pool for several minutes? If they are small enough to get stuck, they should be carefully supervised even if there is no drain in the pool.

  • December 21, 2007 at 8:08 am
    MN Guy says:
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    Although I would generally agree that the government tends to over-regulate many trivial aspects of our society, from the details I’ve heard of this incident it was due to a fairly serious flaw in the way older pools were constructed.

    From what I have heard, this girl was playing in a shallow portion of the pool and unknowingly sat on the drain described. This pool apparently had only one main drain, as many old pools did/do I am told, and thus the girl was unable to get up after she sat on it. Horrifically, the drain had so much suction that it literally removed the majority of her bowels before she could be rescued.

    It is possible that a more vigilant parent or a more thorough maintenance staff might have prevented the incident, but I certainly wouldn’t want this to happen to my young children, or even want my children swimming in a pool where there was a risk that this could happen.

  • December 21, 2007 at 10:51 am
    Chad Balaamaba says:
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    Thanks for the sane explanation. If we can protect from these dangers, why not?

  • December 21, 2007 at 12:14 pm
    bubba says:
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    At least we still have abortion: Thank God those millions of children didn’t have to suffer under George Bush.
    I think if Al Gore had gotten enough votes in Florida to become president, we’d be another country right now. Some other nation with money would have had to buy us out and take over because Al Gore and his Global Socialism and related taxes and policies would have flushed us down the crapper by now.

  • December 19, 2008 at 4:45 am
    ken says:
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    This legislation has caught a lot of pool operators in a bind because the new drain covers were not widely available until late October. To replace them, the operators need to incur costs of thousands of dollars to drain the pools in order to perform the work.

    If you are a pool operator, please visit this site:

    http://www.rentaltoolsonline.com/Underwater-Air-Hammer-Drill-ATEX-Approved-p/101239.htm

    and rent an underwater air powered hammer drill that can help you become compliant with a lot less difficulty and expense. There are thousands of pools that will probably not make the 12/19 deadline.



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