Laundry suddenly smells of bleach

[ItsNotReallyChaos]

The washing machine just finished and all the clothes in it absolutely stink of bleach.

It was a mixed wash on 30 degrees including DC's swimming stuff, two brand new dresses and just general other clothes that have been washed tons of times.

It's a strong bleachy smell and I definitely didn't put bleach in the wash and it's not something I use for cleaning generally. I've had this washing machine for ten years and this hasn't happened before.

The machine itself doesn't seem to smell of bleach but every single item of clothing that was in the wash smells very strongly if it m

Any ideas?

Have you got covid or are you pregnant? Could your sense of smell be off rather than the washing?

Chlorine from the swim stuff?

Did you mix chemicals in the machine that could have reacted together to create chlorine?

I'm pretty sure it's not my sense of my smell that's gone funny. I've checked a few other things and the only thing that smells of bleach is this wet washing.

The smell is stronger than I'd expect from the swimming stuff.

The only detergent that went into the washing machine was Persil non bio. I don't tend to put any other cleaning stuff in.

Could someone else have washed something before you and added bleach to it then?
Is your other half a serial killer? (lighthearted obvs!)

If the clothes are not discoloured it's probably not something in the wash itself. What is your mains water like? Our water often smells of chlorine, could that be the culprit?

If you mixed swimming costumes in with a general wash, I expect that's why everything smells of bleach/chlorine! Sometimes the pools overdo the chlorination.