Given the current climate, what could be more fitting than a post-apocalyptic themed Olympic games? Well, it looks like the organisers of the 2022 Beijing Olympics might’ve taken that a little too seriously with the location choice for the skiing and snowboarding big air events.
“What could be more fitting than a post-apocalyptic themed Olympic games?”
When competitors are about to roll into the kicker of a big air venue, they’re usually used to seeing mountain views and breathing in crisp mountain air but, this time, they’ve got the sight of four cooling towers from the old, and now shut down, Shougang steel mill. Conifers have, in fact, been replaced by cooling towers.
And what could be more symbolic for an Olympic games relying so heavily on man made snow than choosing to host one of the events in an area that was shut down as it was, quite literally, choking the city? Yeah, we’re sure some would argue it’s nice to see an old industrial wasteland being put to good use, as what else are you going to do with it… but also… it does look pretty ugly, doesn’t it?
Social media certainly took notice of this… shall we say ‘unique’ venue choice, promptly taking to their keyboards en masse. We trawled through the internet to find a few of the best.
Snow capped peaks have been replaced by steel structures.
In a widely shared aerial image more fuel was added to the fire as the bleakness of the whole setting became apparent.
Expectation vs reality #Shougang #BigAir pic.twitter.com/07lFXn16X0
— Joséphine K (@jokergaravat) February 8, 2022