Quote:
Originally Posted by Fuzz
http://gizmodo.com/we-finally-know-w...ree-1785276491
Looks like someone screwed up and added 160 litres of hydrogen peroxide that neutered the chlorine. You would think they'd have some sort of, I dunno, record of what was going in the water so they could track these things sooner than a week.
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This is really a sort of fascinating/horrifying screw up. When you combine chlorine with hydrogen peroxide you end up with hydrochloric acid, which the ORP sensors used to monitor chlorine levels would recognize as an oxidizer. This would prevent the automated system from adding additional chlorine to the pool. OTO and DPD testers would also both show chlorine in the water. I can understand the frustration of the pool operators responsible for the facility, and why it took so long to solve.
Clearly the independent contractor who added the hydrogen peroxide never informed anyone he had. It likely never occurred to anyone that someone would add hydrogen peroxide to a chlorine facility. Eventually the chlorine would have used up the hydrogen peroxide and the pool would have gone back to normal. If this hadn't been such a high-profile screw up they probably would never have solved it.
Edit:Full disclosure, I actually had to consult my sister (a chemist) about this because I couldn't figure out why the probes would be fooled. Any mistakes in the chemistry side are likely on my end.