The Opening Ceremony of the XXI Olympic Winter Games was celebrated in fine style in Vancouver, where a jubilant crowd of more than 60,000 people packed into the B.C. Place for the evening extravaganza, the first Olympic opening or closing ceremony ever held indoors.

The ceremonies were dedicated to Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili, killed earlier in the day in a training-run crash on the track in Whistler. An emotional moment of silence was observed in his memory. The seven remaining members of the Georgian team, persuaded to stay and compete, wore black armbands as they marched behind a black-trimmed flag, and the crowd rose to offer applause in respect of their fallen teammate.

International Olympic Committee president Jacques Rogge and Vancouver Organizing Committee chief executive, John Furlong, urged the athletes to compete in Kumaritashvili’s honour. “May you carry his Olympic dream on your shoulders and compete with his spirit in your heart” Furlong said.

The loudest ovation came midway through, when the red-clad Canadian team entered the stadium as the last contingent of the parade of nations.

The cauldron was to be lit jointly by four Canadian sports heroes — all-time hockey great Wayne Gretzky, skier Nancy Greene, basketball All-Star Steve Nash and speed-skater Catriona LeMay Doan, although a technical glitch prevented one of the pillars to rise from the stadium floor.

A second, far larger cauldron was lit by Gretzky in an outdoor plaza along the downtown waterfront, providing Vancouver a strong visible symbol for the Games.

About 2,500 athletes from a record 82 countries are participating in the games, vying for medals in 86 events — including the newly added ski-cross competition. First-time Winter Olympic participants include the Cayman Islands, Columbia, Ghana, Montenegro, Pakistan, Peru and Serbia.