Thursday, 19 September 2024
Thursday, 19 September 2024
Just weeks after hosting the Olympics, Paris inaugurated the 2024 Paralympics on Wednesday with a nearly four-hour-long opening ceremony in the heart of the city.
Against the backdrop of a setting sun, thousands of athletes paraded down the famed Champs-Elysées avenue to Place de la Concorde in central Paris where French President Emmanuel Macron officially declared the Paralympic Games open.
More than 4,000 athletes with physical, visual and intellectual impairments will compete in 22 sports from Thursday until September 8. Organizers say more than 2 million of the 2.8 million tickets have been sold for the various Paralympic events.
Legendary actor Jackie Chan carried the Paralympic torch ahead of the games in Paris. He took selfies and photos with fans who gathered in numbers to watch the relay.
About 50,000 people watched the ceremony in stands built around the iconic square, which is the biggest in Paris and is visible from afar because of its ancient Egyptian Obelisk. Accessibility for athletes in wheelchairs was facilitated with strips of asphalt laid along the avenue and placed over the square.
Javelin throw star Sumit Antil and shot-putter Bhagyashri Jadhav led the Indian contingent out in the athletes' parade of the Paralympic Games' opening ceremony. The 179-strong Indian contingent, which is the largest ever in the nation's Paralympic history, features 84 athletes in 12 different sports.
Antil, who won the javelin gold at the Tokyo Paralympics, had the honour of being the flag-bearer alongside Jadhav, a silver-medallist in shot-put at the Asian Para Games in China.
The opening ceremony was held outside the confines of a stadium, just like when the Olympics opened in the city on July 26. Fighter planes flew overhead, leaving red-white-and blue vapors in the colors of the French national flag, before the delegations entered the square in alphabetical order.
Some delegations were huge — more than 250 athletes from Brazil — and some were tiny — less than a handful from Barbados and just three from Myanmar.
Ukraine's delegation got a loud cheer and some of the crowd stood to applaud them.
Throughout the show, directed by Thomas Jolly who also led the Olympic opening ceremony, singers, dancers and musicians with and without disabilities performed on stage together seamlessly, projecting a theme of inclusion and overcoming physical differences.
Lucky Love, a French singer who lost his left arm at birth, was joined by performers in wheelchairs. Other acts featured dancers with crutches.
The Paralympic flag was raised high into the night sky and its emblem adorned the top of the Arc de Triomphe about 3 kilometers (2 miles) away.
The Paralympic mascot the Phryge perform in front of the Obelisque de Louxor (Luxor Obelisk) at the Place de la Concorde during the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games Opening Ceremony in Paris on August 28, 2024.
Although Wednesday night's show started at 8 p.m. local time, fans had gathered hours earlier under a scorching sun to get top spots along the way. As performers entertained the crowd on stage, volunteers danced alongside Paralympians as they waved their national flags and the sky gave off a postcard-perfect orange glow.
