Bell, a Premier National Partner and the Exclusive Telecommunications Partner to the Vancouver 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, is proud to have helped deliver a golden Paralympics Games to millions of Canadians, with full wireless and wireline network support – including critical two-way radio support – and record broadcast TV coverage.
“The Bell team is honoured to have been an integral partner to the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games, providing the end-to-end network and communications services that enabled both the Games’ operations and the broadcast and online services that delivered a golden Vancouver 2010 to the world,” said Justin Webb, Vice President of Olympic Services for Bell.
Every Paralympic and Olympic image seen on TV, every story read around the world and every real-time score transmitted during the Games was delivered on networks designed and delivered by Bell – networks that also provide a lasting legacy of enhanced broadband connectivity for British Columbia.
“Bell was VANOC’s trusted telecommunications partner at both the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games,” said John Furlong, Chief Executive Officer of the Vancouver Organizing Committee for the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games. “The Bell team successfully executed all the critical network and communications services required to deliver the Games to the world.”
Bell two-way radio first
As the first communications provider in history to deliver both wireless and wireline connectivity for an Olympics and Paralympics Games, Bell also implemented for Vancouver 2010 the first 700 MHz digital radio system using P25 standards in Canada. P25-compliant digital radio systems enhance critical communications by allowing for interoperability between government, public safety and other public and private agencies.
Bell deployed more than 1,500 radios and 325 radio repeaters over 26 sites in a two-layer system to support Paralympic and Olympic staff and volunteers. The first layer – a local area radio network – was deployed to provide communications within sport venues, while the second wide-area network layer provided critical radio links across and between Vancouver and Whistler. Almost 900,000 radio calls were made by event organizers, security and other Paralympic Games staff and volunteers, with an average of 65,000 calls made every day at sports venues.
Record broadcast coverage
Bell provided the telecommunications infrastructure for the record amount of coverage delivered by Canada’s Olympic Broadcast Media Consortium during the 2010 Paralympic Winter Games. All this coverage was available on Bell TV, Canada’s fastest-growing TV service thanks to its leadership in High Definition.
It was the most Paralympics coverage ever delivered to Canadian audiences, and included almost 60 hours of High Definition television, the first time the Paralympic Winter Games have been being produced entirely in HD by a Canadian rights-holder. Bell’s broadcast support team has supported broadcasters at every Olympics since Sydney in 2000.
