How to ensure safety during the 2024 edition of the 24 Hours of Le Mans? The question already arises because of the 2024 Olympic Games. The event will require a lot of security guards. Consequence: many organizers of sporting or cultural events fear for the holding of their events. The Automobile Club de l’Ouest, the organizer of the 24 Hours of Le Mans “identified the subject”. This Friday, October 28, 2022, the ACO ensures “already working on it in conjunction with service providers”.
As an indication, 110 security guards are needed for the organization of the parade of pilots. In 2016, a special year due to the numerous attacks of 2015 and the arrival of several personalities such as Jackie Chan, 800 security guards have been hired for the race.
The 2024 Olympic Games are going to need a lot of security guards. “This event requires 45,000 police and gendarmes a day for three months”, said Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin on France Inter on Thursday 27 October. The Olympics will be the priority “with the terrorist crisis and the difficulties of public order that we are experiencing”. “All units of mobile forces, CRS and mobile gendarmes will therefore be taken by the Olympic Games. An event which, according to Gérald Darmanin, happens “once a century”.
How to organize the other major events planned between May and September 2024?
The Minister of the Interior, Gérald Darmanin, calls “everyone to make an effort”. “I am going to cancel the leave of the police and gendarmes between June and September 2024”, he says. However, he assures that “that doesn’t mean that the other events can’t take place”. They will have to stand “under conditions that allow for fewer security forces than usual”. Gérald Darmanin recalls that “it’s not up to [lui] or to the prefects to cancel this or that event”. It is up to events to adapt. The organizers of cultural events will be received by the Minister
of Culture and Sports, Rima Abdul-Malak, early next week.
The organizer of the 24 Hours of Le Mans points to another problem
It’s not just the security guards who will be in extremely high demand: “Beyond security guards, this also concerns other professions, such as first aiders for example”.