Rio de Janeiro (AFP) – The Australian Olympic team will not move into the athletes village in Rio after it was condemned as “not safe or ready” by the country’s chef de mission on Sunday.
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As dire as the Australian description of the Village sounded, one of the 207 delegations to bed down in the facility was relieved on Sunday to find out its athletes would be able to make it to Rio at all.
The Olympic Village, a 31-building complex located in the Barra da Tijuca district in the west of Rio de Janeiro, is meant to house more than 18,000 athletes and coaching staff over the coming weeks.
Just moments after the IOC decided against a full ban of all Russian athletes, the Australian Olympic team made it known they were not going to be staying in their allotted buildings in the Olympic Village.
Meanwhile, Australia’s nearest neighbours, New Zealand, said they would be welcoming the first of their athletes into the village on Sunday.
“I am a spokesperson between the athletes and Rio 2016, and I guarantee that we have the necessary structure to make sure everything is flawless before the start of the Games”, she said.
The New Zealand Olympic team will still move into the athletes’ village today fixing some of the issues themselves over the past week. For those athletes arriving in the next three days we have made alternative accommodation arrangements.
Carlo Mornati, the Italian Olympic team leader, said that some areas of the village were still not ready and that his national Olympic committee, CONI, had been hiring workmen to carry out repairs for days.
“Whilst we have encountered some maintenance difficulties, this is not uncommon with new build structures of this type and we have been working hard to overcome them”. A plumbing stress test and 2.
Those tests will include all floors, all rooms, all fixtures, sinks, showers and toilets.
Russia, whose participation had been uncertain following revelations of state-run doping, hailed a decision by the International Olympic Committee to not impose a blanket ban on all its sportsmen and women. Depending on who you ask, that could be a good thing or a bad thing: good, because nothing has managed to derail from actually happening.
Chiller’s tough words have caused yet another blow-up in relations between the Australian team and Brazil’s mayor, Eduardo Paes.
The criticism was another embarrassing blow for host Brazil, which is struggling to show all will be well with the 2016 Olympics to open August 5, despite low ticket sales and general public apathy amid a deep recession.
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“It’s just a matter of identifying the leaking pipes which has now been done largely throughout our building and then bringing in the workmen which is now happening to fix those pipes – it’s just tightening connections”, she said.
