It’s not the first time Bridgeport Parks and Recreation Director Joe Shuttleworth and staff at the city pool have had to deal with the problem they’re facing this year. It is, however, the first time they’ve had to deal with it in 17 years.

 

Those noisy, dive-bombing cicadas that are making themselves at home just about anywhere throughout the city are finding an end at the municipal pool. And it’s creating a little more work than usual.

 

“They’ve been a problem on one front because you’re hearing little kids screaming when they land on them. To be honest, you’re hearing people of all ages screaming when they land on them,” said Shuttleworth. “The problem for us isn’t that they’re landing on people. The problem is that they’re getting into the pool.”

 

Since Cicadas are not water inhabitants, most of them don’t leave the pool. As for the main part of the pool, Shuttleworth said once the cicadas land in the pool they end up getting sucked into the suction side of the filtration pump.

 

“That goes into a strainer basket. Typically, the strainer baskets are cleaned thoroughly every three to five days,” said Shuttleworth. “For the last couple of weeks, we’ve had to clean it out twice a day because it is continually filled with cicadas.”

 

While that doesn’t stop the operation of the pool, the cicadas do occasionally stop the operation of the highly popular sprayground. As anyone that has cut grass or weedated in recent weeks, the cicadas are attracted to loud noise and the sprayground offers plenty of that.

 

The facility pumps out 1,200 gallons of water per minute. The noise of that water, said Shuttleworth, also draws the bug.

 

“You have the water and all that splashing and the noise just draws them there and when they get there, the water knocks them down,” said Shuttleworth. “Once they go down, they end up going to the white drainage grates because they right through those grates. They usually end up stacked about four deep all the way across.”

 

And that leads to the problem. Eventually, the grates become clogged up with cicadas and the water can’t go back into the tanks. That creates a couple of issues. First, the water level goes up on the sprayground as ponds form due to water not being able to escape. Second, with the pumps running and no water going into them, the risk of a pump burnout also increases.

 

“When it gets back we have to bring out the shopvac and suck them all out. We didn’t have this problem with the sprayground 17 years ago because we didn’t have the sprayground 17 years ago,” said Shuttleworth. “We did have the exact same problem in the pool.”

 

Shuttleworth said it takes a half an hour to 40 minutes to remove the cicadas from the drains. Often, you have to close off the sprayground to do the work.

 

“Sometimes people aren’t happy, but you can’t risk damaging those pumps,” said Shuttleworth. “If the pumps are damaged you won’t have the sprayground at all.”

 

The P&R crew got another surprise this week. The fountains in front of the Benedum Civic Center were shut off due them being filled with cicadas and needing cleaned out.

 

“It’s safe to say the Parks and Recreation staff and probably 99 percent of the population won’t be missing the cicadas when they’re gone,” he said.