Organizers have been forced to refund general admission tickets for the men’s and women’s snowboard cross events Monday and Tuesday. Vancouver 2010 sent out e-mails advising ticket holders that general admission standing room tickets, priced at $50, have been cancelled and will be refunded.
Heavy warm rains in the last 48 hours have made the general admission standing room area at the Cypress snowboard stadium unsafe for spectators. The rains washed away almost a foot of snow in the area where standing room was to be located.
The cancellation and refund are affecting about 4,000 spectators per event representing $400,000 in lost ticket revenue.
Dave Cobb, VANOC’s deputy CEO and executive vice president, said organizers would wait until Tuesday before announcing any further cancellations. He said, “we’re going to attempt to build some of the spectator areas back up. But at this point I can’t say that we have a high degree of confidence”.
Delivering more snow is not an option as it would disrupt events and practice runs on the mountain.
Meanwhile an electrical failure knocked out the concession stand Saturday night at the ladies mogul finals, and heavy rains drenched the spectators.
VANOC’s Renee Smith-Valade said the lack of food and beverage service as a “challenge”, after the electrical failure and the inclement weather.
She added that organizers plan to fix food service so that there are separate lines for those wanting only a hot drink.
There have also been problems with transportation. Smith-Valade said, “the challenge of Cypress was that given the weather, everyone wanted to leave early, and the transportation plan is designed on the premise that the weather will allow people to stay for the flower ceremony, enjoy the venue, and gradually take the buses out”.
Other transport problems include imported drivers getting lost and buses arriving late.
Smith-Valade said, “buses are like anything, they break down. We need to make sure that when those mechanical failures happen – and there can be human failure – the key is to have measures in place to fix them”.
