While pools offer a great source of entertainment, exercise, and fun, they unfortunately can also prove deadly to young children or even unsupervised older ones. The following tips though, can help keep your family safe and ensure that your swimming pool is a source of fun and excitement all summer long.

Install a Swimming Pool Cover

One of the easiest ways to protect your family is simply to ensure that you have an appropriate pool cover. To some people, a pool cover is designed simply to keep leaves and debris from entering the water and in the past they were difficult to install and maintain.

That has changed today though and while we don’t encourage you to use it like in the video below, this certainly proves how safe they can be at keeping your family out of the water should they wander around without supervision and slip.

This demonstration features the Coverstar Eclipse system.

Install Alarms around the Pool Area

The majority of children who drown do so because they’re able to sneak outside while a parent is making lunch, in the bathroom, or simply has their back turned. Children are naturally curious and drawn to sparkling water. Unfortunately, if the child can’t swim, they can easily slip into the water and drown within minutes. In most cases, children won’t even splash or kick to alert parents, they simply sink to the bottom.

The best way to prevent this from happening is to install alarms on doors, windows, and the pool itself. Home alarms will send an alert through the entire house, stating something such as “the front door has been opened.” Pool alarms have a similar feature, often emitting a loud alarm ring both inside and out to alert parents that someone has entered the pool without their knowledge.
Apart from that, make sure that you have installed proper safety barriers around the pool, so in the event that a child does get too near the pool, they are still protected because of the barrier. Bringing in professionals to perform pool barrier safety inspections for your pool once a while might also be a good idea to ensure that the barriers are truly safe and can avert any accidents.

Avoid Keeping Toys in the Pool

Pools and inflatable toys go hand-in-hand, but they also draw the interest of children. For example, if a child accidentally wanders outside, they may or may not be drawn to a pool instantly. If there’s a giant inflatable duck in the center, however, a child is much more likely to try and venture out to retrieve it.

To prevent this, parents should always remove all toys. This includes diving sticks, inflatable rafts, goggles, and snorkels. Rafts should always be deflated or stored in an area out of the reach of children, such as a locked shed. This will prevent a child from simply tossing the raft in the pool and attempting to go for a swim on their own.

Teach Children Proper Water Safety

Parents should talk to their children from a young age explaining the rules and safety regarding water. For example, rules such as “never go in the water without a grownup” should be reviewed before getting into the pool each day. Parents may also want to put their child in swimming lessons. Children as young as three can be taught basic swimming skills that may prevent them from drowning in the future.

Keep all Safety Devices Nearby

Emergency devices, such as pool stick, life-raft, and an emergency phone should always be kept next to the pool at all times. Parents should explain to their children that these devices should only be touched in the event of an emergency. This will help guarantee that if a child does fall in the water, they can quickly be rescued.