By land, air, and especially by sea, the Mossos d'Esquadra and the Civil Guard coordinate in the large security device that must protect the preliminaries of the America's Cup that will be held this weekend, if the rain allows it, in the waters of Vilanova i la Geltrú.
The town of Garraf is taken over by the security forces and all the essential protection and emergency actors in an event of these characteristics. One gets an idea of the large number of services involved by taking a look at the third floor of the Mossos police station in Vilanova. A room has been transformed into a Cecor, a state-of-the-art coordination center in which all actors, including the organization, are represented.
Real-time images from the cameras in the port area and surrounding areas, others that have been installed for the occasion, and from the drones, helicopters and police vehicles that participate, reach the monitors in the room.
All those in uniform know perfectly well what they have to do and how far their powers extend, beyond the noise that some politicians make these days. The most evident presence in Vilanova is that of the Civil Guard and the Mossos.
At sea, the Generalitat police have their four boats that have been in charge of inspecting ships for a few days now and that this weekend they will put order in the entry and exit movements in the port. Just to witness the preliminaries of the regattas, more than 800 boats have signed up that will not be able to fish and will have to be sailing at all times.
The Civil Guard has transferred a good part of its maritime service fleet to Vilanova with vessels visible from any corner of the port.
They will be in charge of safety at sea and shielding the navigation area of the competition. One of its main vessels, the Río Riaza, houses the operations center, the On Water Operations Center (OWOC), from where those responsible for the organization, the referees of the test, the representatives of the Civil Guard, Maritime Rescue, Captaincy Marítima and the Mossos will be following the regatta and making decisions conditioned by the evolution of the wind, currents or any other element that may affect the race.
Both the Civil Guard and the Mossos have mobilized their underwater units to inspect as required or as a precaution. Just yesterday, the Mossos divers carried out checks on the possibility that a hydrocarbon leak could have occurred that was dirtying the port's waters. It was a false alarm.
Apart from this major operation at sea, the device has a deployment on land to provide security to the thousands of visitors and authorities who will travel to Vilanova this weekend to follow the event. The citizen security units of the Mossos, the Vilanova municipal police work here, as well as specialized units such as the Mobile Brigade, canine or Tedax, which have moved and located in Garraf. The Mossos also have several groups of the GEI (Special Intervention Group) that can travel to a specific point either by sea by boat or by air by helicopter to act in the event of a specific emergency.
The one this weekend is a device that will serve a lot to show that everything is ready and working for the big sporting event of the Cup next year in Barcelona.
