The 2002 Winter Paralympic Games will end Saturday night at the Olympics Medals Plaza in downtown Salt Lake City, with a show featuring singer Patti LaBelle and fireworks shot off from surrounding buildings.
The flame burning in the caldron above Rice-Eccles Stadium will be transferred in a special lantern to the smaller caldron on the plaza stage Saturday morning. Both flames will be extinguished simultaneously during the show, which starts at 7:30 p.m.
The lights illuminating the unique building wraps decorating downtown since last November also will go dark, and the giant photographs of athletes will start coming down on Sunday.
"What you're seeing in the closing ceremonies is a celebration not just the Paralympic Games, but also of Salt Lake 2002. This is all really one series of events," Joedy Lister, the executive producer of the ceremonies, said Thursday.
Lister promised the 1 1/2-hour show would be "a celebration of the athletes, of the volunteers who have made these Games so successful and also of the people of Salt Lake City and the state of Utah."
Utah Paralympian Chris Waddell, who has helped the Salt Lake Organizing Committee put together the Games for the disabled, will speak at the ceremonies, thanking the volunteers. A volunteer, who has yet to be named, will also speak.
Other speakers are SLOC President Mitt Romney and International Paralympic President Phil Craven. Just as in the closing ceremonies of the 2002 Winter Games, a flag will be handed over to representatives of Torino, Italy, the site of the next Paralympics in 2006.
A three-minute video tribute to the Paralympics will also be shown. LaBelle, best known for her 1974 hit, "Lady Marmalade," that was recently used in the movie, "Moulin Rouge," will perform for 40 minutes. She is the only performer in the show.
More than 4 1/2 minutes of fireworks will follow at about 8:45 p.m. Unlike the pyrotechnics at the opening ceremonies for the Paralympics at Rice-Eccles stadium, these will be shot off from a dozen downtown sites.
SLOC's creative director, Scott Givens, said the fireworks should be visible valleywide because the sites include some of the city's tallest buildings. He would not be more specific for security reasons.
The fireworks won't be as big as the 24-inch shells used in the closing ceremonies of the Olympics, but Givens said this probably will be the biggest-ever display for a Paralympics. Some of the fireworks may have to be shelved if there's too much wind, he said.
The Medals Plaza was the site of nightly awards ceremonies for Olympic athletes as well as concerts by performers including the Foo Fighters, Dave Matthews Band and Sheryl Crow.
SLOC spokeswoman Nancy Volmer said fewere than 100 tickets were avaialbe Friday and those were expected to sell out by the end of the day. Tickets, available at Smith'sTix outlets, are $25, $50 and $100.
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