PCMC to make its pools safer

Pune: Against the backdrop of Wednesday’s incident where a 30-year-old drowned in one of the Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation swimming pools, the PCMC administration has planned to reduced the depth of water in its swimming pools to ensure safety of swimmers.
Speaking to dna, Ashok Patekar, officiating swimming pool supervisor of PCMC said, “PCMC has 10 swimming pools, of which six are very deep. Some of them have a depth of 13 to 14 feet, where only trained swimmers are allowed to swim. However, now we have decided to reduced the depth of these swimming pools to make them safer.”
“The depth will be set at around six to eight feet, so that our lifeguards can also keep a watch on swimmers going deeper into water,” Patekar added.
On Wednesday evening, Umesh Ganpat Wakode (30) drowned in the Vastad Balasaheb Gawde swimming pool at Chinchwad. The pool administration has placed a notice board with clear instructions to swimmers not set inside deep waters if they are not well-trained.
Residents have welcomed PCMC’s decision, saying that it will make swimming pools safer.
Mangesh Hiremath, a Chinchwad resident said, “There is no need to have 15-feet deep swimming pools. Anything around eight feet is fine, where lifeguards can see the base of the swimming pool and can act much faster if they see anyone is struggling to swim.”