2010 Olympic Ceremonies

The Opening Ceremony of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver was held on February 12, 2010 and broadcast by NBC. It was the first Olympic Opening ceremony to be held indoors and was dedicated to both the Vancouver Organizing Committee and Nodar Kumaritashvili, a Georgian luger who died earlier in the day in a training run. The elaborate ceremony featured 4,500 performers welcoming the 2,622 Olympic athletes into BC Place Stadium and its crowd of 60,000 spectators. Some of the extravagant sights included a giant, sparkling puppet of a Kermode bear, four giant poles symbolizing welcoming towering over the center of the stadium, and performances by Vancouver natives Nelly Furtado and Bryan Adams. The Closing Ceremony of the 2010 Winter Games also took place at BC Place Stadium on February 28, 2010. It was opened by flag bearers for each nation parading into the stadium in no particular order, an Olympic tradition. The event also featured performances by Nickelback, Avril Lavigne, and Alanis Morissette. At the end of the ceremony, the Games were declared closed and the Olympic flag was transferred from Vancouver mayor Sam Sullivan to the mayor of Sochi, Russia, the host of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games. MORE