Ted Leonsis surprises 200 employees with a trip to Las Vegas to watch the Caps

Ted Leonsis surprises 200 employees with a trip to Las Vegas to watch the Caps

On Thursday, Lorin Hranicka received an email from her boss, Rick Moreland, the senior vice president of executive suites at Monumental Sports & Entertainment. The subject line? Let’s go to Vegas.

“With like a million exclamation points,” Hranicka, who serves as Monumental’s director of suite client services, said Monday.

In the email, Moreland explained that Monumental Sports & Entertainment CEO and founder Ted Leonsis had arranged for 200 full-time employees to make the trip to Las Vegas, where they would be put up in the Excalibur for one night and receive a ticket to see the Capitals play the Golden Knights in Game 1 or Game 2 of the Stanley Cup finals.

“I just stopped dead in my tracks, I was so excited,” said the 30-year-old Hranicka, an eight-year veteran of the company who was among the group of Monumental Sports & Entertainment employees rocking the red inside T-Mobile Arena during Washington’s 6-4 loss to the Golden Knights on Monday. “Just being in the Stanley Cup finals is absolutely amazing. I can’t even explain the feeling.”

Leonsis chartered two flights, one that left Monday morning and another scheduled to leave Wednesday morning, with each one carrying roughly 100 full-time employees from nearly every department. A company spokeswoman said ticket availability prohibited Leonsis from inviting more of Monumental Sports & Entertainment’s roughly 500 full-time employees, so priority was given to employees who work most closely on Capitals-related business and was also based in part on seniority.

Hranicka and the rest of Monday’s traveling party were handed red “All Caps” rally towels as they boarded their 7 a.m. charter flight at Dulles Airport.

“It was an early start to the day, but everyone was very, very excited about it,” said Hranicka, a lifelong Capitals fan who was making her first trip to Las Vegas. “It was very generous of Mr. Leonsis to do this for us.”

Omar Castro, a guest relations manager who has been with the company for nearly two years, was at Capital One Arena on Monday helping prepare the venue for the Game 1 watch party, which drew more than 12,000 fans. He was already looking forward to Wednesday, when he and about 100 other Monumental Sports and Entertainment employees were scheduled to fly to Las Vegas to watch Game 2 in person.

Castro, 34, first learned of the trip on Thursday via a call from his boss, who gave him a heads up that he would soon be receiving an email with details, and that he shouldn’t ignore it, or assume that it was intended for someone else.

“I’ve never replied to an email so fast,” Castro said. “I said, yep, I’m good, I can go, here’s the information that you need.”

Before this season, Castro, a Puerto Rico native, had never watched a full hockey game. After he was named one of the primary guest relations managers for Capitals games, he became determined to learn the sport by peppering his more experienced colleagues with questions. By the start of this year’s playoffs, he said he had a handle on most of the rules. He was also hooked on the team.

“I started sitting at home and watching when they were away and screaming at the TV,” Castro said. “I knew the history of us against the Penguins. They owned us, basically, for years. That last game in Pittsburgh, I have never screamed so loud as when Kuznetsov scored that goal at the end. My dogs started running toward me like something was wrong with me. It was crazy.”

Castro, who worked at Disney for more than 10 years before joining Monumental Sports & Entertainment, said he can hardly believe he’ll be making his first trip to Las Vegas on Wednesday.

“It’s truly amazing and out of this world,” Castro said. “I never expected an owner of the company to do this. We get to share in this with them. … He’s thinking of us as part of a family, as part of the experience. There’s no reason for him to do it. All I can say is a big thanks to Ted and his family for the opportunity, and for truly making this into something memorable for all of us here in the company.”

French group Egis wins UAE railway network project

French group Egis wins UAE railway network project

UAE - Egis, an international group offering engineering, project structuring and operations services, has been awarded a project management consultancy (PMC) contract for the development of the UAE railway network (Stages 2 and 3).

As part of the deal, the French construction major will assist Etihad Rail, which has been tasked with developing and operating the network.

The existing and currently operated network of 264 km will be expanded between now and 2024 by over 600 km in Stage 2 and 250 km in Stage 3, said a statement from Egis.

The UAE network is part of the GCC rail project and will play a key role in the ongoing growth of conventional rail in the Middle East region.

Following its experience acquired in Stage 1, Etihad Rail aims to bolster its team with the skills of Egis, internationally renowned for its experience in project management and technical expertise in all types of railway project (passenger and freight, conventional and high speed), it added.

Under this agreement, Egis will work in close co-operation with Etihad Rail, its group joining the project ownership team to oversee and supervise the different project contributors: the engineering consultant responsible for preliminary design and construction supervision, the future design-and-build contractors, and third parties.

Egis is 75 per cent owned by the French "Caisse des Dépôts" and the rest by Partner executives (Iosis Partenaires), and employees (corporate mutual fund). Employing over 13,600 people, including 8,200 in engineering, the group had generated a turnover of €1.05 billion ($1.23 billion) last year.

For the UAE, delivering a project of this scale will demand extensive expertise and co-ordination. The network is a combination of freight and passenger lines which extends over 1,000 km and has nearly 40 railway facilities (logistics sites for freight, passenger stations, stabling and maintenance depots).

On completion in 2024, the network will link Saudi Arabia to the UAE and Oman. The growth and dynamics of the emirates generate major changes in infrastructure, said the company statement.

The Etihad Rail PMC contract is part of the strategy to further develop in the Middle East and more particularly in the UAE.

Egis said this is its third major guided transportation project in the Middle East region. The other two projects are the Doha metro (project management of Red Line extension) and an autonomous transportation system in Dubai (design engineering and construction of the scalable capacity autonomous shuttle system, Bluewaters Ground Rapid Transit System).

By Staff Writer, TradeArabia News Service

Please don’t forget to share the article with your friends and colleagues through sharing buttons given below. You can share the article on LinkedIn, Facebook, Google+, and Twitter. Also you can FOLLOW ME.

'Spiderman' granted French citizenship after rescuing child from Paris balcony

Paris (CNN)A young Malian migrant who rescued a child dangling from a balcony will be made a French citizen and has been offered a job by the Paris fire brigade, the office of the French presidency said.

Video of the rescue showed 22-year-old Mamoudou Gassama climbing up four floors of the apartment building in just seconds to rescue the child, to cheers from onlookers.

By the time Parisian emergency services arrived at the building, he had already pulled the child to safety.

President Emmanuel Macron invited Gassama to the Élysée Palace on Monday, where he was given a certificate and a gold medal for performing an act of courage and dedication.

Gassama told Macron: "I didn't think about it, I climbed up and God helped me."

He said that when he reached the apartment, he became scared and started shaking.

Macron asked Gassama how the child was when he was rescued. He replied: "He was crying because he was hurt."

Speaking to CNN-affiliate BFM TV after the rescue, Gassama said he had been in the neighborhood to watch a football match in a local restaurant when he saw the commotion.

"I like children, I would have hated to see him getting hurt in front of me. I ran and I looked for solutions to save him and thank God I scaled the front of the building to the balcony," he said.

Mamoudou Gassama was watching a football game when he realized the child was in danger.

The video shows neighbors on an adjoining balcony struggling to pull the child to safety. According to judicial sources, the child's father was out shopping when the incident occurred.

The father is being investigated for abandoning his parental responsibilities, according to a spokesman for the Paris prosecutor.

He is no longer in custody, but will be sentenced in September, the spokesman said. The 4-year-old child has been placed in care.

Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said on her official Twitter on Sunday she had called Gassama to thank him, congratulating the Malian migrant on his act of bravery.

"He explained to me that he arrived from Mali a few months ago with the dream of making a life for himself here. I replied that his heroic act is an example for all citizens and that the city of Paris will obviously be keen to support him in his efforts to settle in France," she posted to Twitter.

The Paris fire brigade tweeted: "Mamoudou shares the values of the Paris fire brigade. We are ready to welcome him."