Petersburg’s swimming pool could be closed another two weeks as water is reheated.
The pool facility was closed the week of January 13 during a week-long cold snap that saw overnight temperatures drop near zero. Multiple problems were discovered including a leak in an under-water light fixture in the lap pool. That was identified and fixed in late January.
Since then the lap pool has been refilled and is being warmed to a usable temperature. Last week the borough filled the leisure pool and started heating that water as well. Borough manager Steve Giesbrecht provided an update during a radio call in show Thursday.
“That’ll probably slow down the heating process in the big pool a little bit because all that water goes through the same set of boilers, but we’re targeting February 17th as it looks like everything will be ready to go,” Giesbrecht said. “We do have some repairs to do but that’ll happen at night and shouldn’t affect when the pool opens.”
Giesbrecht will be acting director of the Parks and Recreation Department with the resignation of Chandra Thornburg last week.
The borough is also hoping to replace and repair coils in heat exchangers that help heat the pool water and air handling systems that circulate air in the building. Giesbrecht writes those need to be replaced because of a combination of age and damage from the cold weather. He’s seeking borough assembly approval to pay for that work, by Ketchikan Mechanical, totaling just over 36-thousand dollars.
