Typhoon Morakot

In case you haven't heard, recently there was a typhoon in Taiwan last weekend. It was a pretty fatal typhoon in which it dumped over 80 inches of rain and killed at least 63 people. The good news is that the olympics will go on. The regions south of Taipei got hit the hardest and one of the regions is where our training site is located. Members of the USA committee are searching for a new training site and waiting to hear word about the conditions of the original site. We start training in 18 days. Hopefully the conditions will be better by then. I wanted to inform you that there is no need to worry since we will continue to have the Deaflympics in Taipei, Taiwan.

Here is the link of an article about Typhoon Morakot: http://www.usdeaflympics.org/articles/article/2009/aug/12/despite-typhoon-morakot-games-go/

UPDATE: US Deaflympics Tweets
Fri Aug 14
All is well with Team U.S.A. training camp center -- no serious damage from Typhoon Morakot. Our team hotel and training facilities are ok!

On a side note, I thought it would be good to provide some background information about the Deaflympics and my travel to Taiwan.

-I will be flying from Milwaukee to Los Angeles on August 26th and then from Los Angeles to Taipei, Taiwan. I will be arriving in Taiwan on August 28th. Training begins on August 28th-September 4th. Opening Ceremonies will be on September 5th and then the Games begin! :) Tennis will start the next day on September 6th with mixed doubles and women singles start on September 7th. The olympics will conclude on September 15th with the closing ceremonies. I will depart from Taipei, Taiwan on September 16th.

Here are some facts about the Deaflympics:

• 77 countries participating


• Over 2,500 athletes


• 144 USA athletes


• 17 sports

Here is the USA Deaflympics website: http://www.usdeaflympics.org/

-Please feel free to check out the website. It will have all the information about the USA athletes participating at the Deaflympics.

Until next time...