Olympic security fears over staff shortages, as athletes' buses get lost

Games chief unrepentant after American and Australian competitors spend four hours on buses travelling from airport to Athletes Village.

The UK government has called upon an extra 3,500 military personnel to work as security guards at the London Olympics after private security firm G4S acknowledged it can’t make up the numbers.

LONDON // Lots of Olympics security guards didn't show up for work and two buses full of Olympians got temporarily lost on London's winding streets, but the chief of the London Games said preparations were going just fine, thank you.

Organisers scrambled yesterday to put the best face on an unfolding security debacle afflicting the Games that start in just 10 days.

"Let's put this in proportion," said the Games chairman, Sebastian Coe. "This has not, nor will it, impact on the safety and security of these Games, that of course is our number one priority."

Yet his efforts were undercut yesterday in parliament, where the chief executive of the G4S security group acknowledged that his company's failure to recruit enough Olympic staff had embarrassed the entire nation.

Some 3,500 more British soldiers, including some just back from Afghanistan, had to be called in on short notice to make up the shortfall.

The head of G4S, Nick Buckles, made a grovelling mea culpa as he was being quizzed by angry British lawmakers in testimony that was broadcast live.

"It's a humiliating shambles for the country, isn't it?" asked the Labour politician, David Winnick. "I cannot disagree with you," Mr Buckles said.

Still, Mr Buckles was hard-pressed to explain why his company had failed to inform officials until only two weeks before the start of the Games that its recruitment efforts had failed.

But the company will pay for its mistakes. G4S said it expected to lose between 35 million pounds and 50 million pounds (Dh201m and 287m) on the contract, which is equal to about 12 per cent of its annual profit.

Making things worse, a couple of buses carrying Olympic athletes from Heathrow airport took a wrong turn on Monday - the big day when athletes started to arrive for the Games, a showcase moment if there ever was one. And the special "Games lane" that they travelled on forced other London drivers into a miles-long traffic jam.

The lost buses - one for Americans, another for Australians - touched a nerve.

From the start of the project, senior organisers had feared repeating the transport troubles of the 1996 Atlanta Games, where one of the biggest problems was having bus drivers brought in from outside the city who didn't know their way around.

Allegedly, that happened again on Monday in London, even though the capital's main airport sailed through its heaviest passenger day ever with short immigration lines and plenty of help for Olympic travellers.

"First day. First arrivals. It's going to happen," said Jayne Pearce, head of press operations.

Mr Coe urged optimism, despite barrage of criticism on Twitter that erupted when an American hurdler took to the social networking site to express his frustration over the four-hour bus urney from Heathrow to the Athletes Village.

"Apart from a mis-turning and a couple of tweets we're in pretty good shape," Mr Coe said.