Is it necessary to drain winter cover/

[Poconos]

I've seen a lot of news clips from the Buffalo area and I sympathize with you. Weather in recent years has been bizarre at best. Here in Northeast PA we've had so many heavy rains in the last 3 years that road crews won't get caught up for years. Bridges out or damaged, road shoulders washed away, etc. Whatever water falls up here eventually winds up in the Delaware River and floods downstream in the Trenton, NJ and Philadelphia areas....and they've had the problems as a result. Somebody up there is mad at the U.S.
Al

[waste]

I have 1 good reason for keeping 'tarp' covers pumped off and clean - what if the tree had ripped the cover? If you develop a hole in one that is full of debris and algae, all the work you did to clean your pool when you closed it is wasted (I think Watermom's cover blew into the pool last year and left her with a real mess this spring).
Just my $.02 - but if you pay that much for it, you're wasting money

[Watermom]

Good memory Waste! But, instead of having a mess to clean up this spring, I took care of it right when it happened. The following links show the pool right after it happened and then about a day or two after shocking with bleach and running the pump 24/7 for awhile to clear it. The dark area in the center are leaves that I vacuumed out after snapping the pic. (By the way - the amount of water and debris on top of the cover wasn't much, but it doesn't take too much to make a mess of your pool!)

http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/attachm...7&d=1144504794

http://www.poolforum.com/pf2/attachm...8&d=1144504810

[matt4x4]

Being only about 1 hour away from Buffalo, I've seen a lot of news reports lately on that big snow storm (we got nothing), and my heart goes out to everyone affected by this freak storm.
Unfortunately, I believe that the weather will only get worse in the years to come, I would think it's our own doing, so my recommendation is for everyone to always be prepared and have a plan that you rehearse regularly with those included in it.
We've done a lot of work and preparation for those freaks of nature, and even though it's a lot of $ up front, you'll be glad you did it even if it's only needed once.
Poconos - I understand your theory behind keeping a cover clean and pumped off, unfortunately, in some climates (like ours), that's all it'll ever be - theory. In reality, I don't think most Canadians would ever be able to keep their cover clean, it would mean quitting your daytime job, or putting all those weekend chores aside so you can stay on top of your cover. and spending most of your other time from November to April fighting off the pneumonia you're bound to get spending countless hours tending to your pool cover. Most times, you don't even have an option since mother nature beats you to the punch and freezes the thing solid before you can walk out there with the pump. This is why i don't bother doing much of anything with my pool for/over the winter - covering it is a huge waste of my time and could lead to my pool getting destroyed in one winter (primarily wind), I'd rather spend 1 hour to vac up some leaves off the bottom come spring time, it would still only be about 1/50th the effort in comparison to a full pool winterization and maintenance thereof.

[markphin]

I keep the water pumped off my cover for no other reason than I don't want the water level on the cover to geat any where near the coping where it could freeze and potentially pop off some of the bricks. Not likely to happen, but why take the cahnce for the minimal effort required.