Olympic Broadcasting Center Evacuated

Wednesday, July 23, 2008


More good news from Beijing today as a gaseous substance flooded the Olympic Broadcasting Center that will house thousands of broadcasters from around the world next month. Via Newsday....

BEIJING (AP) _ Hundreds of people were evacuated Wednesday from the massive building that will house broadcasters from around the world when the Beijing Olympics open, fearing there was a gas leak after people inside smelled a strong chemical odor. But authorities later said it was a false alarm and the smell probably came from building materials or chemicals.

Authorities told workers it was safe to go back in and there were no reports of injuries.

John Barton, the director of sport for the Asia-Pacific Broadcasting Union, said he was in his office at the International Broadcast Center when people began running down the halls and telling occupants to clear out. He said no alarm sounded.

"The gas was swirling down the corridor and the emergency drill, if there is one, wasn't followed," Barton said. "Ladies were running up and down the corridors saying 'Get out of the building,'" he added. "I stepped out of my office and I thought it was some kind of joke — no sirens, no speakers, nothing."
Everything about these Games is borderline terrifying and if I worked for NBC, I would have been praying for a Soccer assignment last month. No way I'd want to head there with all of the smog, weird looking algae and terrorist threats. I also love how they describe the gas as coming from, "building materials or liquids," in the article.

Riiiiight. Nothing to be worried about at all. Go back to work!

Olympics broadcasting center in Beijing evacuated after false alarm over a gas leak (Newsday)

Posted by Awful Announcing- at 11:34 AM

5 Comments:

Well then, we're off to a good start. Someone should tell these Chinese terrorists that Skip Bayless didn't make the trip to Beijing.

GMoney said...
Jul 23, 2008, 12:09:00 PM  

can we get Joe Morgan over there immediately?

Anonymous said...
Jul 23, 2008, 12:14:00 PM  

Four years ago, they were having the same fears about the Athens games, mainly about terrorists since it's much closer to the Middle East. I had a bunch of friends who were over there doing an internship with NBC, and all of them were perfectly fine.

Anonymous said...
Jul 23, 2008, 12:21:00 PM  

I'm not stating anything that others haven't already said, or thought, but it bears repeating; this thing has all the earmarks of a huge clusterfuck.

UnHoly Diver said...
Jul 23, 2008, 4:34:00 PM  

Yep, it sure looks like this Olympics is setting up to go down in history as one of the craziest ever. There may be more books about it 40 years later than O.J. and Chris Benoit combined.

Dre said...
Jul 23, 2008, 5:15:00 PM  

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