The outside pool at the Canberra Olympic complex was closed to the public during the hot conditions of Tuesday afternoon due to a staff shortage.
Operator Belgravia Leisure says it was the result of a miscommunication and it wouldn't happen again.
The outside pool was off-limits to the public on Tuesday from 2.30pm to 6pm, with patrons being told there was not enough staff to open it.
"I can confirm that Belgravia Leisure upper management was unfortunately not made aware that the pool was closed from 2.30pm to 6pm [on Tuesday] after a staff member called in sick with very little notice," a spokeswoman said.
"Belgravia Leisure procedure calls for venues to alert upper management and act ahead of time of any instances whereby a pool or venue may be required to close for any reason and, unfortunately, on this isolated occasion, this did not occur.
"Had this communication occurred, we would have pulled from our large pool of staff across the five ACT aquatic venues to assist in ensuring the pool could stay open."
The closure of the outdoor pool came at a time when the temperature was nearing 30 degrees and when many students had already finished school for the summer holidays.
It's understood many patrons were turned away on the day.
"We apologise to the ACT community for this closure and want to re-emphasise our commitment to ensuring a safe and fun summer ahead with the pools operating as per their advertised opening hours," the spokeswoman said.
"We have already recruited 92 new staff since transitioning into the ACT venues, with plenty more being onboarded over the new few weeks as we hit our peak period."
The closure from 2.30pm on Tuesday was staff-related and not related to the pool being closed in general to the public from 9am to 2.30pm due to a school carnival being held there.
It was announced in September that Belgravia Leisure had been appointed to manage five of Canberra's public pools.
There have been issues with staffing, since then including at the Dickson pool where a one-out, one-in policy had to be employed to handle large numbers of people attending the pool on hot days.
An ACT Government spokesperson said: "ACT Property Group continues to work with Belgravia Health and Leisure during the transition period to make the process as smooth as possible for the Canberra community.
"We understand that Belgravia continues to recruit staff so that all public pools under their management can run at full capacity across the summer."
