Lights go out during first event at Milano Cortina Olympics
The Milano Cortina 2026 Winter Olympics got off to a rocky start on Wednesday morning.
The first events of the Olympics are already underway in Italy, two days before the Opening Ceremony. Mixed doubles curling kicked off the Games, but hit a snag shortly after it began.
Just four minutes into the first end of Canada’s match against Czechia, the lights went out. This lasted for about two minutes before power was restored at the Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium, but there still remained a bit of flickering.
It’s safe to say that this wasn’t quite the start to the Olympics that organizers were hoping for.
šā”ļø POWER OUTAGE AT THE CURLING ARENA!
Play had stopped 5 minutes into Olympic competition. Unbelievable. pic.twitter.com/HcrpqzxCzS
ā Mitch Goldich š (@mitchgoldich) February 4, 2026
The Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium is over 70 years old, having been built in 1955, ahead of the Cortina d’Ampezzo 1956 Winter Olympics.
While it was not an ideal way to kick off the 2026 Games, it was only a brief interruption. The outage didn’t seem to affect Canadian curling duo Jocelyn Peterman and Brett Gallant, who soared to a 10-5 victory over the Czechs in their opening game.
CANADA šØš¦ FOR THE WIN
Itās a dominant opening Olympic mixed doubles curling victory for Canadaās Jocelyn Peterman and Brett Gallant 10-5 over Czechia.
Canada is back on the ice Thursday afternoon in Cortina vs Norway at 8:35am ET pic.twitter.com/3oHCeisjPx
— Devin Heroux (@Devin_Heroux) February 4, 2026
Hopefully this isn’t the beginning of venue problems at Milano Cortina.
There have been plenty of concerns surrounding the readiness of the Milano Santagiulia Ice Hockey Arena, which will host the men’s and women’s hockey tournaments. Construction in the arena is still ongoing, despite the first hockey games being set to go on Thursday.