What are you guys with in-ground swimming pools doing right now with our weeklong freezing temps? Some may have drained your pool pump housings and filter to drain water out of the above ground pipes and shut down the pool. If so what are you doing to keep the actually pool from freezing over? Others may be letting the freeze protection system run your main pump and water feature pump around the clock. But for those of you experiencing rolling blackouts, what is plan B? I had my equipment/pipes covered up in blankets before the snow to keep some heat in there from the pump motors but removed when the snow started falling. Would be good to hear what you guys are doing right now. Hope everyone is well.

We'll previous life and wife, had a pool out West Texas way. We always drained pumps, filters before the freezing hit. Covered pool with floating skimmer for clorine. If yours is up, not drained , wish you luck if you don't have generator power. Is it too late to drain what could bust?

I’m running my main pump 24/7 and turned the heater on to keep water temp at 40 degrees. It had got down to 35 degrees before I turned the heater on. If we just have rolling blackouts I’m hoping that will give me the margin I need to keep the equipment going without freezing.

Mine is running constantly, heater on to 40. We had blackouts thru the night and the pool water got down to 25 degrees. Luckily, no busted pipes and the pump has kicked back on every time the power comes back.

Won’t be a restful next day or two

mine is doing ok so far.....called pool company they just said run main pump 24/7


went outside just a min ago main pump is going but chlorine feeder and water feature filter/pump are frozen solid

mine was rockin along fine until the power went out. Swimming pool guy said I didn't need a cover on the pumps, said running water wont freeze. Glad I didn't listen to him. I put this up every winter just in case. Now I have my Mr buddy running in it. When the power comes back on I should be fine. The other pipes are under ground...

Looks a little different today...

Swimming anyone?

Pool just gave up. Not looking forward to the five digit expense once things thaw out.

Sorry to hear that. Hope mine's doing okay and running the freeze protection it's supposed to. Next house is not gonna have a pool. I'm sick of the worry and expense for maybe 10 days total in the summer with the grandkids swimming.

All our pumps are still running the best I can tell. The shallow part of our pool is frozen enough the kids could ice skate on it. Still have moving water but it was cold last night and didn’t matter.

For you guys running the heaters, I read online that can damage your heater when it is this cold. Any truth to that?

Good question on the heater not able to run in these temps. My heater will not run now.

TLew, so sorry to hear. Your pump quit working?

Update on my situation: I turned the skimmers off and the pump came back on. I think the ice forming around the waterfalls and spa elevation is dropping water level, so by turning the skimmers off it works ok now. My heater will not work, so I've just shut it off opting for flowing water and not replacing a $5k heater.

I am pondering how to fill my pool -- my hose bibs are all frozen and the heat gun didn't do the trick, neither did the torch. I may just have to sacrifice my skimmers for the time being. I'll fill a couple of water bottles with antifreeze, seal them up tight, and put them in the skimmers for the time being.

Got all my equipment covered up with the pump running 24/7. No ice on the pool surface this morning. If the power goes out, I'll just put an electric heater under the cover...oops...there is no Plan B.

I don't do anything special. The system has a freeze mode.

...I hope this weather does not put it to the test.

The heater damage has to do with condensation build up on the burners. At least that is what the internet said.

My pump was running perfectly until the power went off at 2am. Came back on about 16 minutes later and the pump still working. Power dumped again 30 min later, this time for 30 min. Pump came back on. Power dumped 15 min after that for over an hour. Pool froze up in that time so I trudged out and turned off the breaker. Power came back on just as I got in the house. Too late. Guess I'll have to wait till Sat to assess the damage.

Hope you undid all the plugs on the fliter, pump, heater, etc.!

Talked to my pool guy.....he said its preferable to leave all pumps running. he said not to turn the heater on.


I wish he would have said turn the Water Feature pump on originally but it was circulating water at the time i checked and my luck, if it would have been running we would have lost power and i would have had water all in my fountain to freeze. I checked online and they said in many cases a pump frozen solid with water will not damage the pump, but its possible. Praying for that.


What I've found, this is uncharted territory for just about all us Native's. Pool guys recommending the best they know how but most have not dealt with this weather before.


We are all just gonna have to do our best and get thru it

We lost power an hour ago. I’m giving it another half hour or so and I’m draining the pumps. Pool guy said to fire everything back up when the power is on but I’m not going to leave water in the pumps much longer.

Power back on and pumps running. Thank you Mr Buddy heater. Yeeeehaw

I wonder if you could put a portable heater near your water feature pump keep it covered with a few blankets and see if it thaws. May not be frozen solid yet.

I have a warm running floor lamp under 3 moving blankets draped over my main pump and above ground plumbing. At least to keep the temps up a bit.

Finding a lot more drips in my 20 year old pvc connections in many spots during to the temps... will be a spring project to replumb all.

Ours is still running 24/7. We wrapped the pipes as best we could and covered the pump. So far electricity has not gone out. If it does, it does. My wife is in charge of the pool and says if electricity goes out and pipes burst she is done with the pool. Which is fine with me. Our kids have been out of the house for years so it’s mostly just been a pain in the backside.

Ours was doing well until the electricity went out in the middle of the night. By the time I got outside at 6 am, the pump drain was frozen solid. Guess I will see the damage this weekend.

We haven’t had power since this morning. Was on and off all through the night like a lot of y’all. Now that the pool is froze up, I just turned my main power to the pool off. When we get power back, then I will go manually flip the switch back on and see if the pool motor still runs. I don’t think I want to leave it in the on position because if everything is frozen solid, it might burn up the pump if it can’t turn.

I have just left mine completely off. Wait until EVERYTHING thaws before turning it on in a few days. that ice in the pipes will tear up that impellor when it sucks through there if you don't wait for it to be completely thawed.

I just opened up my pump pot a few days before the cold and let it drain. I think it will be okay. My equipment is a tad higher than the pool by probably 3 feet.