CBC/Radio-Canada unveils programming details, broadcast team for 2022 Winter Paralympics
Stay informed with nearly 150 hours of TV coverage, live streaming, digital stories
Canadian Paralympic fans can prepare for nearly 150 hours of television coverage from Beijing, starting with Friday's opening ceremony at 6:30 a.m. ET.
CBC/Radio-Canada announced its broadcast and digital plans for the March 4-13 event on Wednesday, including live streaming on multiple platforms of all five sports — alpine skiing, hockey, Nordic skiing (biathlon and cross-country), snowboard and wheelchair curling.
"Coverage of the Paralympics has improved and increased with every Games, and this is no exception," Martin Richard, Canadian Paralympic Committee executive director of communications and brand, said in a statement.
Josh Dueck, Team Canada's chef de mission at these Games, told CBC Sports having "a quality, robust live coverage plan" is important to growing Paralympic sport.
"This is going to be such an exciting, compelling Games with extraordinary athletes," he added, "and the performances of our team will resonate with Canadians."
Along with Sportsnet, CBC/Radio-Canada is partnering with AMI, a multi-platform media company made for Canadians of all abilities. Each morning, CBC's coverage will be re-broadcast on Sportsnet One, while AMI will offer regular coverage of key competitions.
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Included as part of the basic digital cable package from most TV providers across Canada, AMI is the world's first network to broadcast all programs with open format described video for those who are blind or partially sighted. Described video will also be provided by Descriptive Video Works on all of CBC's daytime television coverage of the Beijing Paralympics.
A team of 49 athletes will represent Canada, including 25 Paralympic medallists and 19 making their Games debut.
Huot joins French TV broadcast
Friday's opening ceremony will be hosted in English by veteran broadcaster Scott Russell and in French by Marie-José Turcotte and retired swimmer Benoît Huot, who won 20 Paralympic medals and 32 at world championships in 20 years with the Canadian national team.
The opening and closing ceremonies (March 13) will be presented with closed captioning, described video and American Sign Language integrations.
Russell will also host CBC's weekend coverage airing in the morning, daytime and late night while weekday shows air Monday to Friday at 3 p.m. and 12:30 a.m. local time.
Former swimmer and four-time Paralympic medallist Summer Mortimer will join Russell in studio for the opening/closing ceremonies and regularly on daily shows.
Radio-Canada will air weekend Paralympic shows from Montreal hosted by Turcotte at 3 p.m. ET. Jean St-Onge will team with Jean-Patrick Balleux and former wheelchair fencer Camille Chai on the daily weekday show from Beijing at 1 p.m. ET.
On the ground in China to bring Canadians the stories of the day are CBC Sports' Devin Heroux, St-Onge and Balleux.
Victor Findlay and Paul Rosen, who won Para hockey gold for Canada at the 2006 Games in Turin, Italy, will handle play-by-play and analysis, respectively, of the Canadian games in Beijing.
Matt Cullen of CBC Sports will call wheelchair curling with Sonja Gaudet, a three-time Paralympic champion in the sport.
New for this year's Games is the daily CBC Sports digital series While You Were Sleeping, hosted by Jacqueline Doorey, who will recap the medal moments and everything of importance to Canadians from the previous night, with an ASL version available daily.
Live streaming of the five sports can be found at:
- cbc.ca/beijing2022
- Radio-Canada.ca/jeux-paralympiques
- CBC Gem (free)
- Paralympic.ca
- CBC Sports App for iOS and Android devices
- Radio-Canada Sports App
- Canadian Paralympic Committee's YouTube channel
Events will also be available on-demand on these platforms along with Amazon Prime Video.
