Tahiti villagers say barge for surf tower construction damages reef

A barge planned for use building a controversial judging tower for the Paris 2024 Olympic surfing competition in Tahiti snagged on a reef and damaged coral near the contest site on Friday, local opponents said.

Residents of Teahupo'o in October protested plans by Games organisers to build the 14-metre (45-foot) aluminium tower to enable up to 40 people to watch, film and judge the surfing at a famed break in front of the village.

Organisers including Paris 2024 and the French Polynesia government said last month they had decided building a smaller, lighter tower on the site was the best option, allowing for smaller equipment to install it - but still requiring new foundations in the reef.

The wave at Teahupo'o is one of surfing's most hallowed venues, where big swells slam onto the shallow tropical reef creating perfect but ferocious tubes.

Teahupo'o has long hosted a contest on the professional world tour, using a modest wooden tower for judges on the reef that locals want to be retained for the Olympics but which organisers say is unsafe.

A video posted on Instagram by Save Teahupo'o Reef, a coalition of locals, surfers and environmental NGOs, showed the barge apparently stuck on the reef, along with broken coral and the barge's damaged propeller.

"The barge got stuck on the reef several times," as locals had predicted, Save Teahupo'o said, adding that this occurred at high tide with no load on the barge.

The group said the authorities had planned to take the associations on the barge on Saturday to show how it would operate but instead went there on Friday without them.

The barge was eventually freed and returned to the marina, the video showed.

"This does not feel good and does not seem worth it," Vahine Fierro, a local