Olympic champion swimmer Gary Hall Jr has been presented with replicas of the 10 medals he won across three Games after the originals were destroyed during the Los Angeles wildfires.
The 50-year-old American received the medals from International Olympic Committee President Thomas Bach during a ceremony in Lausanne.
“Thank you for the medals,” Hall Jr said. “Never before have 10 Olympic medals been replaced, probably because no one has lost 10 medals before.
“I will do a better job at taking care of these.
“The realisation through this process, that outweighs any sense of loss, is this word solidarity and what it means, which cannot be taken away.”
Hall won five gold, three silver and two bronze medals while competing for the United States at the 1996, 2000 and 2004 Olympic Games in Atlanta, Sydney and Athens respectively.
But as the wildfires that killed at least 29 people and destroyed large areas of Los Angeles took hold in January, he was forced to abandon his Pacific Palisades home and leave the medals behind.
“When we were reading your tragic story of losing your house and all your possessions and all your worldly properties, this was going straight to our heart,” Bach said.
Los Angeles will host the next summer Olympics in 2028.
(Source)