ABC Olympic reporter Ben Worsley has been tear-gassed during a disturbance at Rio's famous Copacabana Beach. Here he describes how the incident unfolded:

There were a bunch of kids or youths selling goods to tourists on Copacabana Beach, behind me, illegally. So the local police kicked them off and they started throwing stones at cars and they walked up the street, literally outside the ABC apartment where there are cafes and things, and throwing the barricades on to the street, tables and chairs.

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That's where the riot police started hitting them with tear gas.

We were across the street. It was about a minute later the action had moved up the street, that the tear gas came across us and I had never been caught in that before. It really stings.

Dramatic scenes. I was saying to my cameraman as we were walking up here tonight that we keep hearing stories about security and issues around Rio, Copacabana, Ipanema and at Barra where the athletes village is, we haven't seen any of it and we were wondering what the fuss is about. We saw a bit of it tonight.

Other colleagues who came back quickly when they heard this going on, saw it moving through the back streets of Rio. They were firing tear gas, a colleague of mine saw one fellow lying motionless in the middle of the street.

As far as this main tourist street, Atlantic Avenue, it's back to normal — which means gridlock and a lot of tourists milling around, but no more tear gas, thankfully.

Guess what I wasn't carrying when I was walking here — the ABC-equipped gas mask.