Internet reacts to murky green water in Rio's diving pool The Rio diving pool's dramatic shift from azure blue to murky green is spurring plenty of reaction on social media

in #green7 years ago

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With the four synchronized events complete, Olympic diving has a day off on Thursday before the individual events begin on Friday with the women's 3m springboard preliminary, beginning at 2:30pm ET.

It will give Rio officials a full day to try and bring the color of the diving pool back to its original blue after it inexplicably turned a murky green on Tuesday morning.

The cause, which was originally unknown, was explained on Wednesday as "a proliferation of algae" by organizing committee spokesman Mario Andrada. Later, Andrada cited a decrease in the alkaline level in the diving well.

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The adjacent pool for water polo and synchronized swimming remained blue on Tuesday morning but later began to take on a greenish hue.

"We have treated both pools during the night and the alkalinity levels have already improved," Andrada said. "We expect the color to be back to blue very shortly."

Rio organizers insisted that the water was tested and that athletes are not at risk in the green pools. If that's the case, the color change could actually help some divers.

"From a diving standpoint, the green water is helpful because it's very easy to track the flips and spot where we should reach for the entries of our dives," United States diver Abby Johnston told NBCOlympics.com. "From a health standpoint, slightly concerning to be in water that doesn't have the proper chemicals but not one of us will be thinking about that on competition day."

The 26-year-old Johnston's opinion is an important one. She is in the process of completing medical school at Duke and has a wedding to prepare for next summer.

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Teammate Michael Hixon, who took silver in the men's synchronized 3m springboard on Wednesday, agreed with Johnston.

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"I actually thought it was advantageous for us," he said. "Under the lights that green water is pretty bright, so our visual cues were even easier."

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Sam Dorman: Communication has been huge key to success03:05
A number of other Olympic divers have weighed in on the color of the diving well...

USA's Sam Dorman: "Kermit the Frog had a bath the other day. What can you say? It didn't (bother me at all). It's something that's out of our control. We can't do anything about that."

USA's David Boudia: "Wait is someone playing a joke or are we celebrating St Patty's Day early here in Rio?"

Great Britain's Thomas Daley: "Ermmm...what happened?!"

Mexico's Paola Espinosa: "I haven't seen anything like it before. But it's Brazil and everything is green down here, so maybe it was a decoration to make it look pretty."

Canada's Meaghan Benfeito: "The only thing we said is don't open your mouth in the water, just in case."

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