Spectacular Opening Ceremony gives Paris 2024 a perfect start

The Paralympic Games made a stunning start with a sun-soaked Opening Ceremony on Champs Élysées.

A stunning Tricolore fly past, a medley of French house music and dance routines featuring dozens of performers with disabilities dazzled a 50,000 crowd.

The Parade of Nations streamed down the Champs Élysées to Place de la Concorde, featuring delegations from 167 countries and the Refugee Paralympic Team.

The ParalympicsGB delegation were led into the main bowl by Flagbearers Terry Bywater and Lucy Shuker.

“This is like a dream come true for me,” said Bywater, appearing at his seventh Paralympics.

“When I was first nominated, it absolutely meant the world to me, and obviously being selected by my fellow peers, it was a super proud moment.”

Shuker said: “It’s absolutely incredible. It’s an honour to be nominated alongside Terry, to be the flagbearer, and to lead out ParalympicsGB with all the amazing athletes here. It’s a dream come true, and I think for any Paralympic athlete that’s the pinnacle that they could ask for.”

The Ceremony sought to entertain but also provoke with performances stitched together by the concept of ‘Paradox’, pointing to the contradiction between ‘a society that claims to be inclusive but remains full of prejudice towards people with disabilities.’

In the first minutes, French Paralympic hero Theo Curin drove a Phryge taxi – a red car decorated with hundreds of the Paralympic mascot, Phryges.

As the countdown ended, the Paralympic swimmer yelled “Welcome to Paris” as the sky lit up in red, white and blue, the colours of the French flag.

The Ceremony featured music and dance routines, setting the stage for 11 days of exciting Paralympic competition, that will see about 4,400 athletes from around the world will compete across 22 sports.

IPC President Andrew Parsons said: “By staging this event in Place de la Concorde and Champs Elysées, I feel like Paris is warmly embracing the Paralympic Movement to the heart of this city and the core of this country.”

French President Emmanuel Macron said: “This opening ceremony is more than just a spectacle, it is also a symbol. It represents the Paris 2024 intention to have the Paralympic Games enter a new chapter of a same Olympic adventure, that of inclusion and pushing one’s limits.

“The competition will also be as tough and unbridled as what we have seen over the past month. But in each individual experience, in each personal story, we will read about additional difficulties overcome, this additional effort and courage that make Paralympic athletes sources of inspiration for the inclusive society we wish to build.”