Torremolinos municipal workers participate in ONCE awareness week

Staff from the special employment centre, who were blindfolded, participated in sports activities designed for blind and visually impaired people

Tony Bryant

Torremolinos

Thursday, 3 April 2025, 20:41

As part of the ONCE foundation group in Andalucía, Ceuta y Melilla awareness week, staff from the Torremolinos special employment centre participated in an event at the municipal sports complex on Thursday, where three specific activities promoted by the Spanish federation of sports for the blind were introduced: five-a-side football, goalball and exercises with directional bars. The objective of this initiative, which was attended by sports and social welfare councillors Ramón Alcaide and Gloria Manoja, was for participants, who were blindfolded, to put themselves in the shoes of blind or severely visually impaired people by performing one of these specific sports activities.

The five-a-side football, also known as blind futsal, is played on an artificial grass pitch with teams of five. The teams also have a guide, positioned off the field of play, who provides verbal instructions to the players and conveys information to help them orient themselves using a sound ball.

Goalball, a form of handball designed specifically for athletes with impaired vision, is played with a ball which has bells inside.

Finally, the use of directional bars that are typical in mountaineering are used to guide blind or partially sighted people in cross-country races.

The ONCE week (31 March to 4 April) consists of around 150 activities held in Andalucía and the two autonomous cities of Melilla and Ceuta to raise awareness on the reality of blind people in their everyday routines. This year's initiative coincides with the 200th anniversary of the creation of Braille, the reading and writing system for blind people.

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