Pouring rain wreaks havoc on Paris Olympics amid health concerns over River Seine safety as Team GB wins first medals
27 July 2024, 16:24 | Updated: 27 July 2024, 16:31
Torrential rain continues to cause major disruption to the Paris Olympics after adverse weather left spectators drenched after Friday night's opening ceremony.
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The men's street skateboarding event has been postponed by 48 hours, with delays at the tennis and several crashes in the women's cycling time trial.
Skateboarding organisers have therefore been forced into a hasty rescheduling of the men's street event, which was supposed to start on Saturday at midday but has now been pushed back to Monday.
The pouring rain came amid renewed concerns as to whether the River Seine, which has been part of a £1bn clean-up project, could be safe for swimmers to enter - adding a further headache for organisers after Friday's travel chaos.
Despite the significant investment, it is feared that the heavy rainfall could raise the threat of pollution - specifically E.coli - in the water, foiling plans to make the river safe to swim in for the first time in a hundred years.
Concerns over safety have since plunged tomorrow's scheduled swimming practice for the men's triathlon into doubt.
Read More: Team GB wins first medal at Paris 2024 Olympics in women's synchronised diving
Other events were also affected by the rain, with the start of play in the tennis on the outside courts delayed at Roland Garros.
While Court Philippe Chatrier and Court Suzanne Lenglen have roofs and were able to begin on time at midday, all the others were covered by orange tarpaulins.
British trio Jack Draper, Cameron Norrie and Dan Evans are scheduled back-to-back on Court Six and were among those forced to wait, with Katie Boulter also due to play outside on Court 11.
But the rain did not deter Anna Henderson from picking up Team GB's first silver medal in the women's cycling time trial.
Despite the damp and treacherous conditions which saw several riders come off their bikes, she managed to cross the line to take home second-place.
It comes after Yasmin Harper and Scarlett Mew Jensen won Great Britain's first medal of the Games, winning bronze in the women's three metres synchronised diving.
The International Olympic Committee's morning briefing today was largely devoted to the events of Friday's Opening Ceremony, which saw athletes "paraded" on boats on a six-kilometre stretch of the Seine before a grand finale at the Trocadero, highlighted by a comeback performance by Celine Dion and a hot air balloon cauldron raised into the night sky.
Paris 2024 president Tony Estanguet addressed concerns over the Seine's safety this afternoon, telling press that organisers are "highly confident" the Olympic triathlon swimming sections can take place in the river.
Estanguet, Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo and Marc Guillaume, the top government official for the Paris region, all took a dip on July 17 to showcase the Seine's improved cleanliness ahead of scheduled open water events in the river.
In April, Estanguet acknowledged that heavy rain in the French capital could raise levels of E Coli in the water, despite over a billion euros having been invested in making the river safe to swim in for the first time in a hundred years.
But on Saturday, the morning after dignitaries and athletes were forced to wear ponchos over their opening ceremony finery due to drenched conditions for the curtain-raiser, the three-time Olympic canoeing champion remained convinced everything was on course to proceed as planned.
He said: "Effectively we are still looking at the forecast for the coming days. They expect that it will rain until 5pm today and then it should be fine.
"The team is very confident that it will be possible to have the swimming part in the Seine."
Asked if he would be willing to take another plunge, he added: "I would love to go in again. It would be a pleasure."
Should conditions not be suitable for the scheduled men's triathlon on Tuesday morning, there remains an option to postpone, Estanguet said in April, "from one one day to three days until it's OK."
He also addressed concerns over safety in the build-up to the opening ceremony after French high-speed rail networks including Eurostar were hit by arson attacks disrupting travel to and from Paris only hours before.
The fallout continued on Saturday morning, when four trains from London to Paris were cancelled, affecting thousands of passengers, with disruption expected to last until Monday.
Estanguet said organisers "don't have any information that links this event to the opening ceremony, adding: "What is sure is that security measures have been very, very strong and respected.
"To be honest with you, many people over the last two years believed this opening ceremony would never happen on the Seine because of security reasons, but yesterday we didn't have a single event in terms of security along, before, during or after this opening ceremony."
"It's been fantastically organised, they did a fantastic job. For years now we've been working on this project. Of course, security was the priority but they did it. We did it.
"Security was very high, and yesterday morning when we learned about these SNCF troubles of course we looked at how we would be impacted, and how we would have to react potentially on our side for the football teams that could be affected for instance, but we didn't suffer from any consequences for the opening ceremony and the security was very strong with a good atmosphere."
