Bringing the 2010 Winter Olympics flame to Canada
Bringing the 2010 Winter Olympics flame to Canada –
On Thursday, October 29, Vancouver (VANOC) will become the flame’s keeper for the 2010 Winter Olympics in a handover ceremony in Athens, after a final run by the last torchbearer on Greek soil by Greek-Canadian figure skater Niki Georgiadou.
In the special handover ceremony in the Panathenaic Stadium in Athens, the lit torch is officially handed over to the Vancouver Organizing Committee (John Furlong, VANOC CEO, in attendance for the acceptance in Athens). The Olympic flame is then transferred to and enclosed in a modified miner’s lantern, which can be fuelled with regular lighter fluid. The Olympic flame then begins a 10-hour escorted flight back to Canada on board a Canadian Forces Polaris aircraft, arriving on Friday, October 30, in Victoria, B.C. Also making the trip from Athens were six additional lanterns, four of which were lit during the trip from Athens to Victoria – as “insurance” against the unthinkable (of the flame going out). Four CF-18 Hornet fighter planes will escort that Polaris aircraft into Canadian airspace. It’s the first time the Canadian Forces military is providing an escort for the Olympic flame. Upon arriving on Canadian soil (just after 7 a.m. Pacific Time, Fri., Oct. 30), the Olympic flame burning in the miner’s lantern will be taken to the Victoria, B.C., waterfront. The Olympic flame will then travel across the harbour by canoe and be part of a traditional First Nations welcoming ceremony. After travelling by canoe, the lantern will be carried to the grounds of the B.C. legislature. In a ceremony, the community cauldron will be lit at about 10:10 a.m. PT. Here, at the official starting point of the Canadian torch relay, the lighting of the torch will be about 10:40 a.m. PT., where the first of 12,000 torchbearers will begin the 106-day, 45,000-kilometre journey through every Canadian province and territory, the longest torch relay in Olympic history to be held in a single country. The torch will journey from west to north to east and finally home again to Vancouver on February 12, 2010, the day of the opening ceremonies for the 2010 Olympic Games at BC Place Stadium. By then, this Olympic flame would have visited 1,000 Canadian communities and touched three oceans. Included along the 45,000-kilometre torch relay route will be stops at all 14 Canadian Forces bases across Canada. Visit the official Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics site to follow the 2010 Olympic Torch Relay Route and Interactive Map, October 30, 2009 – February 12, 2010.
Discover the 2010 Olympic Torch video from Vanoc web team – the details of the design and component parts of Vancouver’s 2010 Olympic torch
The 2010 Torch Details:
Torch maker: Bombardier, Inc., the well-known Canadian aircraft/transportation company headquartered in Montreal, Quebec.
Torch length: 94.5 centimetres
Torch weight: 1.6 kilograms
Torch flame outlet size: 30 centimetres
Torch flame: available operating time is 12 minutes for each torch; can withstand wind speed of 60 kilometres per hour and withstand minus 40 (-40) Celsius temperature conditions; torch flame can operate at up to 2,100 metres in altitude.
2010 Torches manufactured: 12,000
Design time for 2010 Torch: 20 months
Number of people involved on design project: 50
Assembly of components for 2010 Torch: 10 minutes per torch with 175 teams of 4 people per team working from August to December.
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