Prior to the start of the Rio Olympics, a bus full of Chinese basketball reporters was caught in a fatal roadside gunfight on its way to Olympic Village, reported the Shanghaiist.
Shortly after arriving in Brazil, the Chinese reporters for the men’s basketball team found themselves pinned down in a deadly shootout 2 km from the airport. While six Brazilians were killed in the exchange, reports indicate that the reporters were able to escape this violent encounter unscathed.
Initially Basketball Magazine posted on Weibo that it was the Chinese men’s basketball team had come under fire, but the magazine later corrected the post. After their arrival, the reporters and the players boarded separate buses. The one carrying the players had an uneventful trip.
Security for the Rio Olympics has been a major concern from the start. Shootouts earlier in the summer caused officials to close off sections of certain streets and neighborhoods.
CNN says that Rio de Janeiro has deployed 14,000 of 85,000 contingency security forces to maintain social order during the Games. Olympics chief Thomas Bach said that he has full confidence in Rio’s ability to secure the Games, but his confidence may be misplaced.
Despite Rio’s best efforts though, the Chinese have had a decidedly rough time in Rio.
In addition to the recent gunfight, Chinese hurdler Shi Dongpeng was vomited on by a robber, whose accomplice stole his belongings while he was in the bathroom cleaning himself off.
Back in April, a group of Brazilian teenagers attempted to rob the Chinese women’s fencing team during an Olympic test event.
After seeing the report on the shootout, a number of Chinese netizens were highly critical of the decision to hold the Olympics in a place as dangerous as Rio. One netizen commented, “I never would have thought that we would need a bulletproof bus for the Olympics.”
Many praised China as a hospitable host during the Beijing Olympics, but given some of their rather unpleasant experiences, the Chinese are unlikely to say the same about Brazil.
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