The Opening Ceremony will be a wonderful, affordable celebration with spectacular performance components that showcase dance, highlight unique abilities and celebrate the athletes. More than 4,000 volunteer performers including dancers, singers, acrobats, athletes, and musicians will celebrate the compelling achievements of the 1,000 athletes and officials from more than 40 countries around the world at the Games. The ceremony’s grand finale will be the lighting of the Paralympic Cauldron, signalling the official start of the Games and the end of the 10-day Vancouver 2010 Paralympic Torch Relay, which starts on Wednesday, March 3 in Ottawa, ON.

About the 2010 Paralympic Games/ Ticket information

Approximately 1,000 athletes and officials from more than 40 countries will take part in five sports (alpine and cross-country skiing, ice sledge hockey, wheelchair curling and biathlon) at the Paralympic Winter Games in Vancouver and Whistler. The international sporting event comes just 12 days after the region hosts the Olympic Winter Games.

Tickets for all Paralympic events are available at www.vancouver2010.com. Tickets for the Opening Ceremony at BC Place on March 12 range in price from $30 to $175. Individual ticket prices to sport events start at $15. Group ticket prices — available for most sport events for groups of 20 or more people — are just $10. More than 70 per cent per cent of all individual tickets are priced at $20 or less.

Customers may also purchase tickets at Main Ticket Centre locations in Vancouver and Whistler operated by the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games (VANOC), or by phone at 1.800.TICKETS (1.800.842.5387). A TDD/TTY service is available for persons who are deaf or hard of hearing at 604.629.7140.