PARIS.- After months of anticipation, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo took the plunge into the Seine on Wednesday to fulfill a long-standing promise to prove that the river is clean enough to host the open water swimming events of the Olympic Games. Olympic Gameswhose opening ceremony is nine days away.
Dressed in a wetsuit, Hidalgo took to the river near the French capital’s imposing city hall and Notre Dame cathedral. She was accompanied by the president of the Paris 2024 Organising Committee, Tony Estanguet, and the head of the Paris region, Marc Guillaume.
“The water is very, very nice. A little cold, but not bad,” Hidalgo said after his swim.
The event is part of efforts to showcase improved river cleanliness ahead of the Games, which kick off on July 26 with a lavish outdoor ceremony that will include a parade of athletes on boats down the Seine. In early June, daily water quality tests showed unsafe levels of E. coli bacteria, which have recently improved.
Since 2015, organizers have invested $1.5 billion to prepare the Seine for the Games and ensure that Parisians will have a cleaner river for years to come. The plan included building a giant underground water storage basin in the center of Paris, renovating sanitation infrastructure and upgrading wastewater treatment plants.
In debt for years:
Despite being a recurring promise among politicians, swimming in the Seine has been banned for more than a century. Former French President Jacques Chirac made a similar promise in 1988, when he was mayor of the capital, but never followed through.
Hidalgo followed in the footsteps of Sports Minister Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, who swam in the river on Saturday, also in a wetsuit. Although scheduled for June, Hidalgo’s swim was delayed by the country’s early elections. On the opening day, the phrase “jechiedanslaSeine” (“I defecate in the Seine”) was trending on social media as some threatened to protest against the Games by defecating upstream.
In addition to the open water competitions, the swimming section of the Olympic and Paralympic triathlons will be held on the Seine.
Source: AP