According to the analysis reports published on Friday by the Paris city hall for last week, the Seine presents pollution that goes beyond the standards required for the Olympic events to take place there.
“Water quality remains degraded due to an unfavorable hydrological context: rain, high flow, low sunshine, temperatures below seasonal standards and pollution from upstream“, informed the Paris town hall.“Things are expected to improve this week given the weather,” commented the prefecture of the Ile-de-France region to AFP. The regional prefect Marc Guillaume had warned that the river would not be swimmable at the beginning of July due to the flow of the river.
The concentration of the two fecal bacteria on which the regulations to authorize swimming are based showed sharply increasing values compared to the first two weeks of June, with very high peaks between June 18 and 20.
The flow of the river, which has increased sharply over the past month, was up to six times higher than usual, reaching 666 cubic metres per second on Sunday 23 June, whereas it is normally 100 to 150 cubic metres at this time. It is because of this excessive flow that the rehearsal of the opening ceremony scheduled for Monday was postponed.
Olympic events in the river (triathlon and open water swimming) but also the opening ceremony must take place in the Seine.
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© France TV
These poor results, due to the weather, have reinforced doubts about the success of the Olympic events in the river (triathlon and open water swimming) but also about the opening ceremony which is also dependent on a correct flow of the river.
In the event of heavy rainfall, untreated water – a mixture of rain and wastewater – can be released into the river, a phenomenon that retention structures inaugurated just before the Games are intended to prevent. Plan B is to postpone the events by a few days, but not to change the venue.
