Lost and found: a young operator learns there's no such thing as 'lost' water--360,000 gallons later.(Lessons Learned)(Certified pool operator)

Just out of college and gearing up for law school, Jeff Maxey found himself in the position of aquatic coordinator in charge of six antiquated pools in Foothills Park and Recreation District in Littleton, Colo.

Foothills Pool, in particular, had a notable distinction. The 485,000-gallon, 50-meter indoor facility includes a 120,000-gallon outdoor training pool on the same filtration system.

Jeff, who had not yet taken any pool operator courses, figured he could prepare the outdoor pool by simply backfilling 120,000 gallons from the indoor pool, which contained perfectly balanced water.

But when Jeff returned to the pool the following morning, the outdoor pool was bone dry. He was dumbfounded. He assumed the water somehow got "lost" in the system.

Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Jeff, a line of maintenance trucks had assembled at the district office, located next door to the pool. After being up all night, the weary maintenance crews were perplexed as to why the basement had filled with water. They thought they had the situation under control--until Jeff decided to deliver an additional 120,000 gallons of water to the dry outdoor pool.

Assuming he was now ready for summer, Jeff went home for the evening.

Imagine Jeff's bewildered look the following morning, when he saw the line of maintenance trucks next door and once again ... found the pool empty.