The
bad news for Rio de Janeiro ahead of the 2016 Olympics keeps coming
after scores of dead fish appeared in the Rodrigo de Freitas lagoon.
With
just over a year to go before the city hosts the Games' rowing and
canoe competitions, officials with the legislative assembly of Rio de
Janeiro Monday launched an investigation into the causes of death both
in the lagoon and in other lakes and bays in the state in which this
phenomenon has occurred.
The group
will work in partnership with the State Environmental Institute (INEA)
and the Secretariat of State for the Environment.
Officials
defended the belief that the latest rains caused a temperature change
of the water and the excess of decaying organic matter, which would have
led to a black of oxygen, killing the fish.
The note released by officials
highlighted that the amount of dead fish has generated a bad smell and
inconvenience to those who live near the lagoon and all the tourists who
flock to the area.
Last week, newly obtained video from newspaper O Globo showed a sailor crashing into trash floating on Guanabara Bay.
The incident took place on February 14 and involved professional sailors Breno Osthoff, 20, and Rafael de Almeida Sampaio, 35.
According to Osthoff, the impact was so great the boat was forced onto its side.
Rio
de Janeiro has pledged to reduce pollution in the notoriously fetid
bay, but last month in an interview with the country's largest sports
channel SporTV, Mayor Eduardo Paes admitted that the bay will remain
mostly polluted for the games.
"The
Olympics are also in a time that has very little rain, then this amount
of debris that comes from five municipalities in the metropolitan
region, with poor sanitation, is also controllable...I do not see as a
problem for the Olympics," said Paes.
Last
year biologists said rivers leading into the bay contained a
superbacteria that is resistant to antibiotics and can cause urinary,
gastrointestinal and pulmonary infections.
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