Paralympics to air in New Zealand via Sky Sport

By David Gold in London

August 19 - Sports lovers in New Zealand will be able to follow the fortunes of their team during London 2012 Paralympic Games on Sky Sport.

Sky Sport will show both the Opening and Closing Ceremonies, as well as day and evening highlights from the Games throughout their duration.

Highlights will air during primetime wherever possible as well as on the Sky Sport highlights channel, which will replay every three hours.

Sky Sport subscribers can also watch highlights via iSky, whose coverage of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Paralympics won an IPC award.

Prime Television will also run two one-hour special documentaries called Black and White – the Paralympic Story, which started last night with a piece on the swimming team.

The cycling team will be featured next week.


The news goes some way to help ensure the broadcasting of the Games reaches as wide an audience across the world as possible.

Footage of around 780 hours will also be shown at www.paralympic.org.

New Zealanders will be particularly keen to follow the fortunes of triple Paralympic gold medal winning swimmer Sophie Pascoe (pictured above), as well as middle distance runner Tim Prendergast, looking to claim another Paralympic gold after winning T13 800 metres gold at Athens 2004.

"The London 2012 Paralympics will break many records," International Paralympic Committee (IPC) President Sir Philip Craven said.

"They are set to be the first in the 52 year history of the Games to sell-out, with nearly 2.5 million tickets sold, and will be broadcast in more countries than ever before with a cumulative audience of four billion around the globe expected to tune in."

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