The 2002 Winter Games will end tonight with a massive fireworks display that organizers promise will light up the Wasatch Front.
The 4 1/2-minute display at the end of tonight's show will feature eight 24-inch shells, the largest fireworks ever shot off in the United States.
A total of 10,000 fireworks will be shot off from 11 locations across four miles of the Wasatch Mountains, between the illuminated rings above downtown to just north of I-80.
The pyrotechnics are just part of the party that organizers are promising for the closing ceremonies at Rice-Eccles Stadium.
"The opening was more ceremonial, more dignified, more stately. The closing is more of a celebration," executive producer Don Mischer said Saturday.
To make his point, Mischer noted that the Mormon Tabernacle Choir and the Utah Symphony performed "The Star-Spangled Banner" at the Feb. 8 opening ceremonies.
Tonight, the national anthem will be sung by N' Sync.
The televised portion of the show will start at 6:45 p.m. with a brief fireworks "salute," Mischer said, and then the athletes who have competed here will enter the stadium and take their seats at the south end.
Unlike the formal "parade of nations" held during the opening ceremonies, the athletes will probably run into the stadium rather than march behind the flags of their countries.
Later in the show, they're expected to scramble down to the field. Because much of the stadium floor is covered by ice for the skating segments of the show, a 100-person crew is set to scatter sand to make the surface safe.
Musical acts include KISS, Bon Jovi, Christina Aguilera, Earth Wind and Fire, Gloria Estefan and Moby. One segment of the show will focus on different types of music, such as jazz, Latin and big band.
KISS will represent rock with their song, "I Want to Rock & Roll All Nite" while Olympic skaters Kristi Yamaguchi and Katarina Witt take to the ice with 100 other "divas."
Other Olympic skaters featured in the show include Ilia Kulik, who will appear with Broadway dancer Savion Glover, and Dorothy Hamill, who will skate to Harry Connick Jr.'s version of "Somewhere Over the Rainbow."
Another segment will use black light to illuminate 100 skaters carrying props decorated with ultraviolet paint. Mischer said it is probably the largest theatrical event ever staged under black light.
There will be some so-called protocol moments, including the introduction of Vice President Dick Cheney and speeches by Salt Lake Organizing Committee President Mitt Romney and International Olympic Committee President Jacques Rogge.
Also, the Olympic flag will be handed over to Torino, Italy, the host of the next Winter Games in 2006, by Salt Lake Mayor Rocky Anderson.
And the caldron that has burned above the stadium since being lit during the opening ceremonies by members of the 1980 "Miracle on Ice" men's hockey team will be extinguished. Plus, the Olympic rings on the hillside above the city will be turned off.
Charlotte Church and Josh Groban will sing the song, "The Prayer," as the flame goes out, and a pair of skaters will perform a piece choreographed by Olympic ice dancer Christopher Dean.
Ticketholders must be seated by 5:30 p.m. for pre-ceremonies instruction on audience participation.
E-mail: lisa@desnews.com