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Why was it the neighbor's responsibility to safe guard the pool? It is not their responsibility to childproof their yard because their neighbor can not properly watch a child. We do not know how well the neighbors knew each other they could have not known that the grandma was watching the kids. Expecting others to change their yard or house because you can not be a responsible parent or guardian is unfair.
If you have a pool, you will have a fence and a gate with a lock. Try getting home owner's insurance without one.
But the lawn guy, pool man, meter reader might leave it open
Interestingly, all the pools around here must have a self-closing, self-latching gate.
I've always found that annoying, bc sometimes I need to carry things in and out and, for example, my backyard gate requires a pretty heavy object to hold it open, but it seems wise now.
Even when we installed the driveway gate (you know, one of those remote control moving fences that blocks off the entrance of your driveway), the installers told us that they had to have an automatic closing feature any place that had a pool. So you open it, drive your car through, but the gate was programmed to close after a certain amount of time. The law says one minute for all automatic gates.
We were able to have that feature turned off bc we have the regular perimeter gate still fencing off our yard beyond the driveway.
None of this makes a difference if the kids climbed over or through the bars.
The law here is very particular about how high the fence is, protrusions being disallowed (I suppose so they can't be climbed), how the spacing can be from side to side and bottom, etc. Even the height of the latch and whether they have to be on the inside of the fence or outside.
None of these things is as good as alert, diligent supervision.
If my kids had gone missing with a pool next door, that pool is the FIRST place I would have checked.
To be fair though, maybe the grandmother didn't know there was a pool next door?
As someone else said, the kids were missing an hour before calling 911? That hesitation might very well have cost those kids their lives. Someone may have been able to revive them if they had been found earlier. So sad.
What a nightmare! My middle child is a wanderer and my youngest loves to follow him(or help him escape) so we've had to put extra locks on all the doors and we're thinking of doing the same for some windows even. Kids can be very sneaky. When they're being quieter than usual you gotta go check on them...that's when they get in the most trouble.
If I had a pool, there's no way I wouldn't have it completely enclosed by a fence with a locked gate.
For precisely this reason. It's a no-brainer.
And, no - I wouldn't say "Well, the parents should have been watching them so I don't need my pool secured."
Yes, it's true that those toddlers should have had supervision. But I wouldn't rely on that. I'd rather put up a fence and gate, than know a child died because I didn't.
There was a pool fence (iron fencing) AND a yard fence. The gate to the yard fence was left open, it seems, but NOT the pool fence. But they were able to squeeze thru the iron fence.
There are ordinances regarding pool fences. If the iron fence meets those requirements, it seems like the pool owner is not at fault.
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