Sun Shines On Sochi, No Worries Over Hijack

(ATR) The first full day of competition for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi opens to magnificent weather. The sun is pouring over venues in the mountains and on the coast where eight sports are in play with medals to be won in five events.

Women’s hockey, speed skating and team figure skating are taking place in the coastal cluster. In the mountains the new events of skiathlon and slope style snowboard make their debut along with events in cross country, freestyle ski and luge.

The first medals of the Games will be awarded tonight in the medals Plaza of the Olympic Park.

Hijack Downplayed

Sochi 2014 president Dmitry Chernyshenko has downplayed the bomb threat made by a passenger who attempted to hijack a domestic flight in Turkey to Sochi.

The incident occurred while the Olympic opening ceremony was underway.

The reportedly drunk Ukrainian man had shouted that there was a bomb on board and tried to enter the cockpit of the aircraft operated by Pegasus Airlines, which had 110 passengers on board. He was subdued and later detained by Turkish security forces on arrival at Istanbul’s Sabiha Gokcen airport.

"We were aware of this incident. I know the Ukraine and Turkish authorities did their best to fix this hooligan incident," Chernyshenko told a press conference Saturday.

Russian security forces have been on high alert since the December suicide bombings in Volgograd, which is around 400 miles northeast of Sochi. Some 40,000 security troops have been deployed in and around the Black Sea resort.

Chernyshenko did not say if additional security measures had been taken by Russia in the wake of the bomb scare.

Asked by Around the Rings why there was no no-fly zone in place for the Olympic opening ceremony, as there has been at previous Olympics, the Sochi CEO said: "Nobody closed the fly area around Sochi, despite the record number of state leaders arriving and departing from Sochi."

He said that 260 operations for landing and taking off "very close to maximum" capacity had taken place on Friday.

Today, the emphasis was on departures, with more than 145 flights.

Sochi 2014’s head of communications Alexandra Kosterina added: "Security measures are very solid. All of the necessary security measures are taken."

Opening Ceremony Glitch

Commenting on the opening ceremony, Chernyshenko said: "It really was incredible, overwhelming and exciting. I am very proud of what we have done last night."

Asked what comments Russian president Vladimir Putin had made about the show, he said: "After the opening ceremony, the president expressed his gratitude towards the team, deputy prime minister Dmitry Kozak and all the creative team "He was satisfied with the result."

The ceremony contained one obvious glitch when the Olympic rings were unveiled early in theprogram from a cluster of five sunflowers, the symbol of the Sochi region. One of the sunflowers failed to transform into a ring, leaving the symbol of the Games missing the top right ring.

Despite the technical problem, IOC communications chief Mark Adams said all the feedback he had heard had been "absolutely fantastic". He said athletes were "super happy. They were integrated in the opening ceremony in a great way".

"It was brilliant in the stadium and on TV even better. People enjoyed it. I don’t see what the problem is," he said about the Olympic rings gaffe.

Russian TV viewers got to see the complete set of rings courtesy of video recorded from one of the rehearsals when the rings were fully revealed.

Empty Seats Plans

Even though it was clear to see there were empty seats dotted around the Fisht Olympic Stadium for the Games curtain-raiser, he claimed the venue was full and there wasno need to fill seats with volunteers.

Empty stands were also visible Saturday at the slope style snowboard event although the venue was largely full.

Three weeks ago Sochi 2014 still had 30 percent of tickets to sell for the Games.

At the daily briefing questions came about the ticketing strategy and if, like London 2012 organisers, Sochi 2014 had contingency plans to fill empty seats with volunteers.

"We are very lucky to have huge demand for the tickets," Chernyshenko said, although he couldn’t give figures. These would be revealed at a separate media briefing on ticketing, he said.

"If there will be any empty seats, then we will discuss it. So far so good," Chernyshenko added.

Kosterina revealed that Games organizers indeed have a program for volunteers to give them a chance to attend competition venues "and we will use it if need be".

Media Housing Update

Chernyshenko was asked again about the hotels issue that has made headlines in the past week, with many media and some NOCs angry about unfinished accommodations.

"All hotels are new that’s true and we had not much time to test infrastructure and sometimes issues happened. We immediately reacted," he said.

"I expect questions about accommodations will pass at the start of the competitions."

Sochi By Numbers

A total of 44,431 people visited the Olympic Park Friday.

584 doping tests were carried out on athletes up to Friday night.

Wo ist Thomas?

IOC president Thomas Bach is at cross country and will hand out the medals tonight

Written by Mark Bisson and Ed Hula

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