Rio 2016 - Double Olympic medallist on the delights of Guanabara Bay

by Sail-World.com NZL on 14 Jun 2016 Olympic Gold and Bronze medallist, and now a windsurfer coach, Bruce Kendall has made several trips to the 2016 Olympic venue at Guanabara Bay.

He updates on the pollution issue which is clearly not going to be resolved in a couple of months, and also shares his views on the venue from a sailing competition perspective.

He writes:

I must say they have cleaned up the water quality inside Marina de Gloria considerably by putting in a new plumbing system taking the sewage going into the marina somewhere else - but this has not happened for the whole bay.

The trash over the last weeks has been as bad as I have ever seen and the boats scooping up the boats have been pretty off the pace. I have only seen them out there once in the last three weeks I have been here.

Last week we had a lot of rain and the Bay was especially bad for the last three days. I have seen two garbage boats out going under 3 knots mostly in between the tide lines for less than an hour or two each day. Not very motivated or effective.

It has been impossible to pass the tide lines without getting hooked up and there is a lot of random plastic trash in between. Worst I have seen any where in the world.

Random things like dolls, motorbike helmets, mattresses, large plastic bags, and heaps of small plastic and polystyrene items floating around.

Racing is random with trash in the water. Microbes and bacteria are scarier still. Filtered but seemingly untreated sewage is pouring into the harbour. Pictures do not carry the stench.

With a government in disarray due to massive corruption linked to Petrobras and other government controlled resources and a general disregard for helping the poor and spending on education and health coupled with massive violent crime & murder rates, the health of the environment comes a distant concern….

Brazil has 21 of the top 50 cities the worlds with the highest murder rates. [Strangely Rio is not on that list where gunfights happen every week according to locals]

Last year the President initiated an investigation into government corruption linked to Petrobras uncovering billions of dollars going into government ministers pockets.

This investigation has been halted by a political coup against the president.

It's a pity about the water quality and ruination of the environment.

The literaly tons of dead fish last year has been linked to a chemical spill by Petrobras. No one was held accountable.

The sailors will sail regardless when there are medals to be won.

In the last three years, I have known of a number of sailors who were fully submerged after falling into some of the worst water, and they did not get sick.

The stats on the levels of bad bacteria in the water are pretty scary and some sailors have become very sick.

I have seen windsurfers be catapulted dangerously over the front of their boards at high speed during races due to hitting submerged garbage and losing a good finishing position in that race.

Many sailors have to stop and clear their foils during races because the items caught around the foils slowed them down too much.

I know Torben Grael had high hopes that the as per the Brazilian Olympic bid doc presented to the IOC, Rio would clean up the bay and return it to being the jewel it was not so long ago.

I am sure he weeps.

What could the IOC possibly do to solve this with a government in this state?

Aside from the water quality and dangers on the land, with the variety of courses, Rio’s bay, and the coast is possibly the most dynamic yachting venues for the Olympic games ever.

The outside courses offer Open ocean sailing, sometimes with big swell and some places very big confused chop going to windward against the big swell.

Strong or light winds are possible - even with dead flat water.

Sea breezes, gradient winds, and dramatic geographical features and massive hot flat land sometimes creating massive thermal influences which all affect and often alter the wind forecasts for all courses.

A massive harbour with very deep and irregular channel depths and widths creating strong and variable currents, back eddies, upwellings and whirlpools which often do not correspond with tide time tables or models well.

This is a great sailor's Olympic sailing venue, not just a speed course or guaranteed one set of conditions for any of the courses. Tricky to create a reliable playbook here!

The great sailing conditions will reward clearly accomplished sailing Medalists. But the trash and poor water quality will always be remembered.

I live in hope Brazil can clean up all its mess within my lifetime.