Cleaning and maintaining the two waterparks at Morey’s Piers means fighting against some of Earth’s strongest forces: strong winter winds, the Atlantic Ocean, encroaching sands, and thousands of squirming children. But Morey’s Piers is up for the task, even if it takes 50,000 gallons of chlorine and a winter task force to do it.
Will B. Morey, operations director for both Ocean Oasis and Raging Waters, said that his team fights against even the appearance of being unclean. That’s tough, because sand looks dirty when it gathers on the bottom of a pool, and sand is everywhere; both waterparks are built directly on the ocean. Guests bring sand in on their towels, on their flip flops, and sometimes, strong winds and splashing tides catapult sand right into the park.
It’s a “constant battle” against the elements, Will said. The battle is getting more intense each year at Ocean Oasis, the North Wildwood waterpark. The beaches here are shrinking each year, and at the same time, tides are rising further inland. Will said that the bulkheads, which protect Ocean Oasis from the ocean, take heavy beatings from the ocean’s tumult.
“The winter of 2023 was a huge challenge for us,” Will told Do the Shore. “So much sand infiltrated the park that we had to bring in hydraulic machines, skid steers, basically a very small bulldozer, to get the sand out of the lazy river. It washed in all winter long.”
The off-season is an important time for the waterpark; it’s when true deep-cleaning, important renovation, and structural upkeep begins. Morey’s Piers employs a crew of local folks, who Will described as retirees, to clean the park as summer approaches.
“They take a lot of pride in getting the waterpark ready,” Will said. “They start to help us get the winter off the place; pressure washing, getting off rain water, scrubbing pools, getting the decks ready, getting the pools ready to be filled.”
A separate crew keeps the cleaning effort going even through the chaos of a summer day. This is where the unexpected can occur, and the team has to be ready to clean up any kind of mess.
That second team, Will said, spends their time “emptying trash cans, cleaning up spills, cleaning the bathroom, and importantly, checking the chemical levels of all pools multiple times throughout the day.”
He stressed how vital it is that all of the water within the park meets New Jersey’s regulatory standards. Chapter IX of New Jersey’s State Sanitary Code is a complicated tome that details not only the acceptable chemical balances for public bathing water, but how the systems can be installed and maintained.
Hidden beneath the park is a vast snaking network of artery-like pipes, filters, and tubes which give the park its lifeblood. It is here that the water is filtered and treated with chemicals like bromine and chlorine. It’s a whole lot of work, but Morey’s has been doing this with extreme care for decades.
“We work hard to keep things neat and tidy throughout our back of the house operations, but it is a never-ending effort,” Will said. “It’s interesting to think about all the piping running under the concrete walkways. They carry thousands of gallons per day up slide towers, down slides, into pools, through another set up pipes to be filtered before returning to the pools or tops of slide towers.”
The pipes underneath each park are orderly given the constraints: the parks were built over 30 years ago and the plumbing had to fit in a pre-determined footprint. “If you go to a newer facility like Great Wolf Lodge, I’m jealous of their pump rooms!” Will said.
Will’s humility obscures the fact that some of the water features at the park are one-of-a-kind in the industry. A favorite are the “Sky Ponds,” which whisks guests and their tubes through four giant floating pools, dozens of feet in the air. They are all connected by a maze-like series of slides, culminating in a big drop at the end.
Slide towers, like the one used to access the high-up Sky Ponds, are another item of frequent maintenance. They are frequently re-painted, steps have to be replaced, new traction tread needs to be laid down… And every nut and screw holding the slides, and the access towers, together will eventually rust because of the salty air.
“We have replaced every bolt that keeps the slides together, and the links to the support structure below,” Will said. And the slides themselves won’t stay slippery unless a gel-coating is re-applied to every square inch of the ride area.
“That’s a really heavy job,” Morey said.
But it’s the children’s sections of the parks that require the most attention to keep going.
“The most complicated areas are actually the kiddy areas,” Will said. “There are so many small water features that can get clogged with sand.”
Still, all the maintenance in the world can be overshadowed in a second if somebody drowns at the park. Morey’s employs over 300 lifeguards each summer, all trained and accredited by Jeff Ellis & Associates’ International Lifeguard Training Program, the world leader in aquatic safety training.
Jeff Ellis, for whom the group is named, invented the 10/20 standard, which states that lifeguards should scan their entire zone of responsibility every ten seconds, and that anybody in the zone can be reached within 20 seconds.
“What people don’t always notice, however, is that every 5 minutes, a bell chimes in both Water Parks,” Will said. “This is an indicator for all lifeguards who are scanning to change their position. So you’ll see seated lifeguards stand up for a few seconds, or, standing lifeguards take a couple steps to each side.”
Things have changed a lot since Morey’s opened its first waterpark in 1988. Two waterparks means twice the support staff, twice the maintenance, twice the overhead. Still, Will Morey sees these dual waterparks as two of their strongest assets, thanks in large part to slide design by Fred Langford. Langford was a Cape May Court House local who transformed the waterpark industry with his innovative slide designs.
Running two waterparks on the edge of the Atlantic isn’t for the faint of heart, or the disorganized. But for Will, the chaos is worth it. He is a young father who is now seeing the park through fresh eyes thanks to his children.
“We get to create these incredible memories for families every single day,” Will said.
This article was written as part of a paid partnership between Morey’s Piers and the Herald.
Contact the author, Collin Hall, at chall@cmcherald.com
