Vanishing water still a mystery at Bert Lipps Pool

The mystery of why 90,000 gallons of water was escaping from Bert Lipps Pool every day and where it went continues to stump city of Lewiston employees more than two weeks after they closed the facility unexpectedly.

At this stage, the city doesn’t know the cause and won’t reopen the outdoor pool built in 1946 until it can identify what’s wrong and fix it, said Lewiston Parks and Recreation Director Tim Barker.

The pool, which holds 210,000 gallons of water, is entirely empty. It typically loses 6,000 to 8,000 gallons of water each day for reasons such as splashing and evaporation, he said.

“The reason why the pool is closed now is because of safety concerns,” Barker said. “We obviously don’t want to continue to put water into something (when) we know there’s an issue.”

The pool’s water comes from the system that is under irrigation restrictions because of the rupture of High Reservoir, he said.

Bert Lipps didn’t open June 12, a Monday that was supposed to be its first day of operations for the summer because of a chemical imbalance, thought to have been caused by a huge storm three days earlier, he said.

The chemical imbalance was corrected and the pool at 604 13th St. was open June 13, the only day the pool has been open this summer, Barker said.

That evening, the city realized the issue was more complicated and closed the pool indefinitely.

The investigation of the problem so far has led only to dead ends, Barker said.

“It has developed a number of leaks throughout the system over the years,” he said. “Routine maintenance has been completed annually.”

Lewiston’s wastewater treatment plant hasn’t received an unusual volume of chlorinated water with a high level of acidity, something that could have indicated the pool’s drain hadn’t been closed, he said.

Dye placed in pool cracks didn’t surface anywhere that provided clues. The main pipe that feeds water into the pool has been ruled out as the source of the problem.

Manholes near the pool were bone-dry. And there aren’t any unusually green places of vegetation in the land surrounding the pool, something that could indicate where the water was going, Barker said.

A ground-penetrating radar didn’t find any significant holes around the perimeter of the pool or in its vicinity. Now that the pool is empty, the radar will be deployed again to look for voids underneath the pool.

Cameras will also be run through pipes in the pool’s system, Barker said.

With operations at Bert Lipps indefinitely suspended, the city is attempting to keep its roster of water activities as normal as possible.

Extra sessions of swim lessons have been added at the Orchards Pool, something that’s possible since all but one employee of Bert Lipps Pool transferred there, he said.

Orchards Pool is generally busier than Bert Lipps.

A total of 4,331 people used Bert Lipps pool last year, compared with 6,775 people at Orchards Pool for open swim season, Barker said.