At the sailing venue for this summer's Olympic Games, a vast algae bloom has covered the coastal waters with a bright green slime. The Chinese government is scrambling to clean up the mess before the games begin in early August, and more than 1,000 fishing boats have already been mobilized.
"We can only haul the blue-green algae manually and we're doing all we can with our arms full and by the boat-load," said Wang [Haitao], a sailing spokesman for the Beijing Games organizing committee. "All you can see is fishing boats along the coast" [Bloomberg].
Besides being a concern to the sailors who plan to compete in the Olympic regattas, the algae explosion is also another instance of bad publicity highlighting China's polluted environment.
The country's three-decade economic boom has left its waterways and coastlines severely polluted by industrial and farm chemicals and domestic sewage [AP], whichcontain high levels of ...
