# Pool cleaning chemical question **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Tags:** movies\ **Created:** [November 7, 2023, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737 "2023-11-07T06:55:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![thevolleyballer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cc9497/32.png) [@thevolleyballer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thevolleyballer)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 6:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/1 "2023-11-07T06:55:57Z")
I know nothing about pool maintenance, but have heard of chlorine to kill microorganisms. I’m watching this movie The Boys Next Door - it’s starting off with these juvenile delinquent boys who crash a classmate’s party where there’s a pool. 1 guy jumps in fully clothed, and it’s clear the pool wasn’t supposed to be used. The homeowner’s son yells at the guy, whose buddy says ‘don’t piss him off or he’ll piss in the pool’. Homeowner’s son says ‘he can’t; my dad told me there’s a chemical in there that will make him purple’. I thought he was bluffing to get the guy not to piss. Sure enough, juvenile delinquent does piss & the audience sees a purple cloud near where he pissed; some gets on him and stains the clothes he was wearing. a) is this real, there’s a chemical that does that? Obviously it’s something that reacts with uric acid. I did the litmus test experiments in school, is it like that? b) what chemical is it, they don’t say. ---
**Author:** ![engineer\_comp\_geek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/engineer_comp_geek/32/504_2.png) [@engineer\_comp\_geek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/engineer_comp_geek)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/2 "2023-11-07T07:06:38Z")
Wikipedia says that the existence of this type of chemical is a myth. > **[Urine-indicator dye](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urine-indicator_dye)** > > Urine-indicator dye is a mythical substance that is supposed to be able to react with urine to form a colored cloud in a swimming pool or hot tub, thus indicating the location of people who are urinating while they are in the water. A 2015 report from the National Swimming Pool Foundation called this "the most common pool myth of all time", with nearly half of Americans surveyed by researchers believing that the dye existed. > Urine is difficult to detect, as many of the naturally occurring compou... ---
**Author:** ![thevolleyballer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cc9497/32.png) [@thevolleyballer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thevolleyballer)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 7:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/3 "2023-11-07T07:56:25Z")
bamboozled by Hollyweird…I’m shocked 😆. Well, it looks striking in the movie scene - here it is: ([https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3ki76r?start=930](https://www.dailymotion.com/video/x3ki76r?start=930)) ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/4 "2023-11-07T12:29:42Z")
If such a thing existed, then every public, school, and hotel pool in the world would be using it and you’d have seen purple (or whatever color) clouds in pools with your own eyes. ---
**Author:** ![pullin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c57346/32.png) [@pullin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pullin)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/5 "2023-11-07T13:15:58Z")
I know the pee-detecting chemical’s a myth, but pools do react to some weird things. My hot tub turned a brownish color and gained a hard-to-scrub ring around the top, following each visit by the same group of girls (guests of my son). Finally figured out one of the gals was sporting a spray-on tan, that she frequently refreshed. Something in the spa chemicals leached it away into the water, and she’d revisit the salon to refresh it before boating with the group. Then they’d retire each evening to the spa, where her “tan” would end up in the water. Rinse (literally), repeat. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/6 "2023-11-07T13:33:52Z")
I bet that put you in a bit of a lather every time you had to clean it too. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/7 "2023-11-07T17:30:52Z")
Pools and spas are basically mini water treatment plants. ---
**Author:** ![Spiderman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spiderman/32/230_2.png) [@Spiderman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spiderman)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 7:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/8 "2023-11-07T19:51:39Z")
SCUBA classes & trainings are typically done in a pool - clear water for the student & instructor to see each other, a shallow end to learn (& stand up if necessary) & a deep end to practice what you learned in the shallow end. However, the shit floating around in the deep is disgusting; hair, band-aids, small UFOs - unidentified _floating_ objects. Even when I’m the first one on the pool deck & have totally still water that stuff is invisible until it’s inches from your face. ---
**Author:** ![AlsoNamedBort](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alsonamedbort/32/3213_2.png) [@AlsoNamedBort](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlsoNamedBort)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/9 "2023-11-07T22:41:53Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > If such a thing existed, then every public, school, and hotel pool in the world would be using it and you’d have seen purple (or whatever color) clouds in pools with your own eyes. No public pool would use it because the pool would be constantly filled with purple clouds. It’s not like when someone pees in a pools there’s a quick way to clean it up. ---
**Author:** ![thevolleyballer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/cc9497/32.png) [@thevolleyballer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thevolleyballer)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2023, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/pool-cleaning-chemical-question/992737/10 "2023-11-07T23:30:16Z")
which actually strengthens the point that if such a chemical existed it would be used in scenarios like in the movie; private pool not supposed to be used when the parents ain’t there. The way it’s set up is to look like the homeowners’s son is bluffing to dissuade pool-pissing. But the consensus is there is no such chemical. It’d be funny if 1 is invented alluva sudden & we see people walking around with purple stains.