AT Ancient Greece in the main arena sports competitions in the Peloponnese, before they began, a fire was lit, born from the rays of the sun at the temple of the god Zeus.
He recalled the courage and courage of the titan Prometheus, who, in order to help the human race, gave him ethereal fire, stealing him from heavenly heights. As punishment for this, he was chained to a rock in the Caucasus Range, where he experienced torment every day when an eagle pecked at his liver. The Olympic flame burned continuously until the end of the games, indicating to the athletes that there is always a chance for a feat.
The first Olympic Games were held in 776 BC. e. Then the fire, lit at the altar, was delivered to the main arena by forty people trained for this purpose, who passed the torch along the relay race for 2.5 kilometers.
At the Olympic Games of today, the lighting of the fire is an essential ritual, which was revived in 1928. For this, the Marathon Tower was erected in Amsterdam.
The modern history of the Olympic torch, or rather the relay race with it, began in 1936. Then it passed in twelve days, and more than three thousand runners took part in it, passing fire from the temple of Zeus to the Berlin stadium.
After 12 years in 1948, in addition to athletes, rowers participated in the relay. Since then, each time the number of torchbearer sports and options for transporting fire has increased.
1952 was marked by the first Olympic torch relay before the Winter Games. It was then lit in the fireplace of a house in the village of Morgendal in Norway, where Sondre Nordheim lived, and the fire was carried all the way by skiers. In the same year, on the eve of the Summer Olympic Games held in Helsinki, the torch made its first flight.
And before the start of the Melbourne Olympics in 1956, the torchbearers rode on horseback. In 1964, the Olympic flame was lit in Olympia for the first time, and since then, except for the 1994 Winter Games, this tradition has not changed.
The opening of the Olympics, held in Mexico City in 1968, is memorable because it was the first time a woman was entrusted to host it. The relay in 1976 was marked by the fact that before it was carried out, the energy of the flame made its way from Athens to Canada on radio waves, where the torch was re-lit using a laser beam.
In 1992, the honorable duty of lighting the fire was entrusted to the Paralympic athlete Antonio Robollo, who did this with the help of a burning arrow shot from a bow directly into the Olympic bowl. And for the first time, the Olympic flame had a chance to visit space in 1996.
Underwater travel torch made on the eve of the competition in Sydney in 2000. Then the Olympic flame stayed for more than three minutes in the depths of the sea near the Australian coast.
In 2004, the route of the Olympic flame circled the entire planet, and the torch went around the world. The relay race lasted 78 days and had a distance of 78 thousand kilometers. The number of athletes exceeded 11 thousand people.
On the eve of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing, the fire was transported on a large national canoe with the head and tail of a dragon, and also climbed Mount Everest with Chinese climbers.
Today, the Rules of the International Olympic Committee state that the relay route passes through the territory of the country in which the games are held. Therefore, the path of the 2014 Olympic Games relay is a path through Russia that lasted 123 days and stretched for 65,000 kilometers.
The symbol of the Olympics, the torch of the Olympic flame, arrived in Moscow on Sunday, October 7th. It will continue the traditional Olympic relay, which began in Greece, and will pass through many regions of Russia for 123 days. The general rules for the relay race and the Russian stage of the Olympic torch journey are in the material AiF.ru
Photo: www.globallookpress.com
ceremony traditions
In antiquity, before the Olympic Games, the fire was lit in the temple of the goddess Hera in Olympia and delivered to Athens. This tradition was associated with the name of the mythological titan and protector of the people Prometheus, who stole fire from the gods from Olympus and gave it to people.
In 1928, the tradition was revived in Amsterdam, where the fire was lit again at the Olympic Stadium.
The first torch relay started at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Then the flames traveled more than 3 thousand kilometers before getting from Greece to Germany.
Currently, the ceremony of lighting the Olympic flame is held a few months before the start of the Games in the Greek city of Olympia on the very spot where the temple of Hera stood in ancient times.
Eleven actresses, portraying vestal priestesses, light the flame with a parabolic mirror that focuses the sun's rays. Then, from this fire, the torch of the first participant in the relay is lit. It is designed in such a way that it does not go out from wind and rain, and natural gas is its fuel.
According to tradition, the torch with the Olympic flame is carried by runners who pass it to each other. It is considered a great honor to be a torchbearer, and famous athletes often take part in the relay.
The flame can also be transported by car, by water, by plane, by rail.
Photo: RIA Novosti
From the history
There are many cases of rather original ways of delivering it to the capital of the Olympics. So, in different years, the torch was transported by airplane, Indian canoe and even by camel.
In 1976, the flame energy was converted into a radio signal and transmitted from Athens to Canada. The signal was then used to re-ignite the torch with a laser.
In 2000, the torch was submerged under water for several minutes, divers swam with it near the Great Barrier Reef. And in 2008, before the Games in China, the flames were transported in a traditional Chinese boat called a dragon boat, which is a large canoe with the head and tail of a dragon.
Before the Olympics in Athens, the Olympic flame went on a round-the-world trip that lasted 78 days. The route was 78 thousand kilometers, and more than 11 thousand torchbearers participated in the relay.
Currently, only the national relay is held, limited to the territory of the country hosting the Olympics. This decision was taken by the International Olympic Committee.
The Olympic torch relay ends in the host city of the Games. With the help of a torch, a large bowl is lit in the Olympic Stadium. The fire burns in it until the closing ceremony.
Olympic torches installed at the Olympic Museum in Lausanne, Switzerland Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
Relay rules
The rules of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) state that the relay route does not have to be in a straight line from Olympia to the host city. The route should have its own “zest” and reveal the color of the host country, so it can run both throughout the state and through certain points on the map. Each route is developed by the Olympic Committee individually. It should be noted that the relay runs around the clock. If the route is laid through mountain ranges or water bodies, then special vehicles are used. The last leg of the relay is entrusted to one of the best athletes in their country.
In order to become a participant in the relay race in your city, you must fill out an application for participation on the official portal of the Olympic Committee. At the same time, out of tens of thousands of applicants, preference is given to candidates with special merits in the field of sports, as well as in other areas of life. In addition, in 1992, representatives of other countries were officially allowed to participate in the Olympic torch relay, since then the team of torchbearers has been multinational.
The relay itself is, in fact, running over certain distances. Each torchbearer runs an average of 200-300 meters, after which he transfers fire from one torch to another identical one. The transfer process is informally referred to as the "Torch Kiss".
To prevent the Olympic flame from dying out outside the relay, the torch is kept in a special container.
After the Olympic Games, all the symbols and attributes of the Games, including the Olympic torch, cannot be used by the host city without special permission from the IOC.
Relay on the eve of the Olympics in Sochi
Olympic torch relay ahead of XXII Olympic Winter Games and XI Paralympic Winter games will be held across 83 constituent entities of Russia and will become one of the largest winter relay races in history. Torchbearers will carry fire through 9 time zones, raise it to Elbrus, lower it into the waters of Lake Baikal and even send it into space. The length of the route will be more than 40,000 km, the fire will travel in the hands of torchbearers on foot, as well as in airplanes, trains, reindeer and dog teams.
The Olympic torch will arrive on February 7, 2014 at the Fisht stadium in Sochi, where the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympic Games will take place.
Are five rings of different colors, a hymn, an oath, an olive branch. The most impressive in its entertainment was the Olympic flame, which surpasses all previous symbols.
Olympia - the birth of the Olympic flame
The birth of a symbol
This tradition has existed since the times of Ancient Greece, which has successfully survived to this day. According to one ancient Greek mythology, it was believed that Prometheus stole fire from the god Zeus and carried it to Earth, where he transferred the fire to people. For which he was severely punished later. This symbol was founded in honor of Prometheus. At the beginning of the last century, this tradition was renewed. It has been preserved to this day. Now, before each Olympics, the Olympic torch relays are held. For the first time, such a relay race was held in Germany in 1936, when fire in the form of a burning torch was delivered from Olympia itself to the city of Berlin. The Olympic flame is lit in the city that wins the competition to host the Olympic Games. It is lit on the first day of the opening of the Olympics and continues to burn until the very last day.
How fire is born
The lighting of the fire takes place long before the opening of the games - in Olympia. Eleven actresses are involved in this unique spectacular performance. They represent the priestesses. Then a fire is lit. As a rule, a torch is lit, which is then delivered to the city. According to a long-established tradition, the torch is passed from hand to hand by runners. Special lamps are used to prevent the Olympic flame from fading.
After lighting the fire in the homeland of the Olympic Games, it moves towards the city that will host the next Olympic Games. The apotheosis of everything is the lighting of the Olympic torch at the main stadium of the Olympics.
Who is honored
The Olympic flame is always lit by one of the most famous athletes. It has already become a tradition. This tradition is accompanied by a theatrical performance. It is often based on a particularly significant history that is characteristic of the state. For example, at the Tokyo Olympics, the honor of opening this event fell to a student who was born just on the day when Hiroshima was bombed. It became a symbol of the revival of the country of the rising sun after the Second World War. When the games were held in Canada, the Olympic flame was lit by two schoolchildren speaking different languages. By this, the unity of Canada was shown. And the first woman who was lucky enough to open the games by lighting a fire was Mexican Norma Enriqueta Basilio de Sotelo at the 1968 Games in Mexico City.
Invariable part of the Olympic Games - olympic fire- which has been used since ancient times. According to tradition, the fire is lit in the Greek city of Olympia from the sun's rays. After that, the torch is delivered to its destination by relay method, and on the day when the fire reaches the city, the grand opening of the Olympic Games begins. A large fire is lit, which continues to burn until the solemn closing ceremony ...
EsSochi 2014 Olympic torch tafeta will be the largest in the history of the Olympic movement, breaking all records for duration (123 days) and length (65,000 km). Moreover, according to the statement of the President of the ANO Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee Dmitry Nikolaevich Chernyshenko, The fire will not only be carried through the whole of Russia - it will visit the bottom of Lake Baikal, as well as on the top of Elbrus, at the North Pole and even in space.
Lighting a fire for winter Olympic Games in Sochi will take place a week before the start of the relay, September 29, 2013 on the territory of Greece Ancient Olympia.
In ancient Greece, fire symbolized purification, rebirth. It was a gift from Prometheus to people. Recall that Prometheus stole it from Zeus, for which he was severely punished.
Relay transmission of fire also went from ancient Greek times. Each city of Ancient Greece was equipped with an altar with fire, which did not go out for a moment.
In 776 BC, athletes began to compete in the ancient Olympic Games. Especially for their opening, the fire was lit and transported to the finish line.
The process of delivering the Olympic flame meant maintaining the purity and strength of the natural elements in a stable state. This was taken care of by 10 Athenian tribes, who allocated 40 trained young men for this process. These youths delivered a torch from the altar of Prometheus straight to the Athenian altar. The distance was 2.5 kilometers.
The modern torch relay traces its history back to 1936, when the Olympic Games were held in Berlin. The first athlete to start a relay in the modern era was the representative of Greece, Konstantinos Kondylis. And the first fire at the stadium was lit by the German Fritz Schilgen. Since 1960, the transmission of the Olympic flame has been broadcast on television.
Lighting the Olympic Flame - 2012
The tradition of lighting the Olympic flame existed in ancient Greece during the ancient Olympic Games. The Olympic flame served as a reminder of the feat of the titan Prometheus, who, according to legend, stole fire from Zeus and gave it to people. The tradition was revived in 1936 and continues to this day.
1936: The Olympic Flame was lit from the sun's rays using a concave mirror in Olympia, Greece, and carried to Berlin by over 3,000 runners. German athlete Fritz Schilgen lit the Olympic flame at the opening ceremony of the XI Olympic Games in a stadium decorated with swastika banners.
1948: The Olympic torch at the end of its transfer on the bridge over the Thames at Windsor towards the Empire Stadium (Wembley Stadium) for the opening of the London Olympic Games.
1948: British athlete John Mark delivers the Olympic torch to the Empire Stadium at Wembley and inaugurates the 1948 Olympic Games by lighting the symbolic flame.
1952: Finnish runner Paavo Nurmi lights the Olympic flame at the opening ceremony of the Summer Games at the stadium in Helsinki.
1956: Australian athlete Ron Clarke, junior mile champion, delivers the Olympic torch to the stadium at the Melbourne Olympics. The torch-passing ceremony was disrupted during the conflict when a student named Barry Larkin successfully handed a fake torch made from underpants attached to a chair leg to the mayor of Sydney.
1956: Italian speed skater Guido Caroli falls while delivering the Olympic torch at the opening ceremony of the 7th Olympic Winter Games in Cortina, Italy. Karoli stumbled over the microphone wires laid on the ice field, but did not let go of the torch.
1960: Italian student Giancarlo Peris holding a torch after lighting the Olympic flame in Rome at the opening of the 17th modern Olympic Games.
Rome hosted the first commercially broadcast Summer Olympics, which was also the first major doping scandal, when Danish cyclist Knud Enemark Jensen collapsed during a race under the influence of Roniacol and died the same day. day.
1964: Yoshinori Sakai, a student born in Hiroshima on the day of the first atomic bomb that destroyed that city, carries a torch up the stairs to light a fire in a bowl at the opening ceremony of the Tokyo Summer Olympics.
1968: The "High Priestess" raises the Olympic torch high in the ancient Greek city of Olympia, from where it will be carried to Mexico City.
1968: Mexican hurdler Enriqueta Basilio became the first woman to light the fire in the Olympic bowl at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Mexico City.
1973: National flags around the Olympic flame in Munich are flown at half mast in memory of 11 Israeli athletes who were victims of Arab terrorists.
1976: Stéphane Préfontaine and Sandra Henderson light the Olympic flame at the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games in Montreal.
1980: The Olympic Flame rises over Lenin in front of the Lenin Stadium at the Moscow Olympic Games.
1984: Gina Hemphill, granddaughter of Jesse Owens, delivers the Olympic torch to the Coliseum in Los Angeles.
1988: Torchbearers greet the crowd after lighting the Olympic flame in the bowl at the 1988 Olympic Games in Seoul.
1992: An archer aims a fireball at the Olympic cauldron in the Montjuic stadium at the official opening ceremony of the Barcelona Summer Games.
1994: A ski jumper prepares to descend with the Olympic torch in hand at the 1994 Winter Olympics in Lillehammer.
1996: Former champion boxing in heavyweight and 1960 Olympic gold medal winner Mohammed Ali lights a fire at the Olympic Stadium in Atlanta at the opening ceremony of the Games.
2000: Wendy Craig-Duncan, a marine biologist, on the Great Barrier Reef, Australia, delivers the Sydney Olympic torch underwater.
2000: Torchbearer Cathy Freeman lights the flame in the Olympic chalice at the opening ceremony of the Sydney Olympics.
2002: The 1980 U.S. Olympic team cheers after the lighting of the Olympian flame at the opening ethtvjybb of the Salt Lake City Winter Olympics.
2004: Actress Thalia Prokopiou, dressed as a high priestess, lights a torch from the Odymnia fire, obtained from the sun's rays with the help of a parabolic mirror, in an ancient sanctuary, where in 776 BC. the first Olympic Games took place.
Greek sailor Nikolaos Kakalamanakis lights the Olympic flame at the opening ceremony of the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens.
2008: A demonstrator tries to snatch the Olympic torch from broadcaster and torchbearer Konnie Huq during the torch delivery stage in London. Demonstrations to protest human rights violations in China and actions in Tibet took place along the route of the delivery of the Olympic flame.
2008: Gymnast Li Ning delivers the Olympic torch at the opening ceremony of the Games at the National Stadium in Beijing.
A high priestess with a lit Olympic torch and an olive branch, during the dress rehearsal of the Olympic flame lighting ceremony, which took place on May 9, 2012 in ancient Olympia, Greece.
The Olympic torch is being handed over to Spyros Yianniotis, a 32-year-old Liverpool-born swimmer who won a silver medal in Greece during the open water competition four years ago in Beijing.
Spyros Yianniotis, world champion swimmer, carries the Olympic torch during the dress rehearsal for the Olympic Flame Lighting Ceremony ahead of the London 2012 Summer Olympics held on May 9, 2012 in ancient Olympia, Greece.
First torchbearer Spyros Gianniotis, world champion swimmer (pictured left) passes the Olympic flame to British boxer Alexandros Loukas on May 10, 2012.
The Olympic Flame of the 2012 London Summer Olympics lit at Ancient Olympia on May 9, 2012.
"Look at the torches of the past winter olympics! Their appearance can be described by the words “kvadratish, praktish, gut”. Our task was to develop a completely outstanding design, with a kind of primordially Russian “sub-twist”. But most importantly, it must be sincere. Not just a dry and functional industrial design, but a soulful one!” - Vladimir Pirozhkov pronounces the last word with an aspiration. Vladimir is the head of the industrial design and innovation center AstraRossa Design, where the appearance of the torch for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi was developed.
About seven years ago, Vladimir Pirozhkov could not have imagined that he would leave his sunny villa in Nice, return to Russia and engage in winter torch building. A graduate of the Sverdlovsk Institute of Architecture, he almost hitchhiked left the country in the early 1990s and ended up as an apprentice to the founder of biodesign, the legendary Luigi Colani. Then he successfully worked as an interior designer at Citroen, where the interiors of the C3, C3 Pluriel, C4 Coupe, C5 models and the C6 Lignage specially “sharpened” for French President Jacques Chirac came out from under his pen.
Then he worked at the Toyota European Center in Nice, where he rose to the rank of head of the division that deals with “cars of the future”.
And in 2007, the then Minister of Economic Development of the Russian Federation, German Gref, visited the Toyota Design Center in Nice with a tour, who invited the designer to return to his homeland. This is how the AstraRossa Design center was born, the debut of which was the visual style project for the SuperJet 100 aircraft.
“The task of designing the design of the torch for the Winter Olympics in Sochi fell on us like snow on our heads,” says Vladimir. - A couple of years ago, the Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games held a competition for the design of the Olympic torch. We applied and, of course, hoped to get into the final, otherwise what's the point of participation? But hope was cautious. Why? Look who designed the torches for at least two past Winter Olympics: Pininfarina (Turin, 2006) and Bombardier (Vancouver, 2010). Against the backdrop of such giants on a planetary scale, our compact Russian company looked simply defiant, but we still submitted an application. And a month later we got a call from the organizing committee.”
Appearance and ergonomics
According to Pirozhkov, there is not a single straight line in the design of the torch, all the lines are ornate, they are neither western nor eastern - they are ours. The body is made of die-cast aluminium. Red polycarbonate inserts, painted bright yellow on the inside, create a sense of inner glow. The color scheme embodies the motto of our Olympics: "Ice and Fire". And the design idea is based on an artifact that the heroes of Russian fairy tales are so eager to get - the feather of the Firebird.
Ergonomics of the torch, says Vladimir Pirozhkov, raised many questions. “Unlike the torches of the Summer Olympics, the Winter Olympics should be better protected from the vagaries of bad weather. Accordingly, they are more powerful and heavier, and this imposes additional restrictions on ergonomics. For example, the torch of the Vancouver Olympics weighs only 1.8 kg, but it is uncomfortable in the hand - it dangles. And if you take Turin - for 2 kg, but perfectly balanced! We tried to move the center of gravity as close to the torch handle as possible and as a result retained the Canadian weight and Italian ergonomics.”
Let's digress a little from the topic and recall the torches of past Olympiads:
The modern Olympic Flame Lighting Ceremony is performed by eleven women, portraying priestesses, during which one of them lights the fire with the help of a parabolic mirror that focuses the rays of the Sun. Then this one, however, other methods of transportation were used at different times. In addition to the main torch, special lamps are also lit from the Olympic flame, designed to store fire in case the main torch (or even the fire at the games themselves) goes out for one reason or another. At least one case is known when the fire went out during the games (Montreal, 1976, during a rainstorm).
The tradition of lighting the Olympic flame existed in ancient Greece during the ancient Olympic Games. The Olympic fire served as a reminder of the feat of the titan Prometheus, who, according to legend, stole fire from Zeus and gave it to people.
The tradition was revived in 1928 and continues to this day. During the 1936 Olympic Games held in Berlin, the Olympic torch relay was held for the first time (based on the idea of Joseph Goebbels). More than 3000 runners participated in the delivery of the torch from Olympia to Berlin. At the Winter Olympics, the fire was lit in both 1936 and 1948, but the relay race was first held in 1952 before the Winter Olympics in Oslo, and did not originate in Olympia, but in Morgendal.
So, olympic torches Let's take a closer look at some of them.
Torch of the 1972 Olympics in Munich (Germany)
The main feature of the design of the Games was the famous pictograms of athletes, designed by Otl Aicher. The gas torch was made of stainless steel and has been tested for endurance in various weather conditions, except for extreme heat. When the temperature reached 46 degrees Celsius on the way from Greece to Germany, a special sealed torch had to be used.
Torch of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow (USSR)
The fate of the Olympic torch in the USSR was dealt with by a department specially created in 1976 of the Office of the Olympic Torch Relay of the 1980 Games. A group of specialists had to decide what the shape of the torch and its internal structure would be. It was originally planned to entrust its production to the Japanese, but the Soviet officials did not like the torch they proposed in the form of a reed. As a result, the development was entrusted to the Leningrad Machine-Building Plant. Klimov, and the specialists of the enterprise were given only a month for this. A group of engineers led by Boris Tuchin met the deadline, thus setting a kind of record. In total, for the Olympics, the plant produced 6200 torches with a gold-colored top and handle. Cylinders with liquefied gas were placed inside the torches, as well as special cords soaked in olive oil, which gave the flame a pink tint.
Torch of the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona (Spain)
The choice of the capital of the 1992 Summer Olympics was to be made in 1986 at the 91st session of the IOC. Among the contenders was Barcelona, whose delegation used an interesting move during the presentation. On the map of Europe, burning torches marked the capitals of past Olympics, but the Iberian Peninsula was drowning in darkness. The idea of the Spaniards was appreciated, and Barcelona received the right to host the games. It only remained to create a torch that would not be similar to the previous ones. Such a responsible task was entrusted to industrial designer Andre Ricard. His goal, as he himself put it, was to give the torch a "Latin character". As a result, Ricard created one of the most original torches in the history of the Olympics. In shape, it resembled a long nail, the “hat” of which happened to be a bowl for fire. The unusual torch was appreciated by the residents of 652 settlements, where the Olympic torch relay was held.
Torch of the 1994 Olympics in Lillehammer (Norway)
For the first time, the Winter and Summer Olympic Games are being held alternately every two years. This slim torch has been tested for wind resistance. The fact is that he was brought to the Lillehammer stadium by a ski jumper, holding a torch in flight at arm's length. And again, as before the Olympics in Oslo, the fire was lit not in Greece, but in the Norwegian Mordegal. This time, the torch relay stretched for 12,000 kilometers. But unexpectedly, the Greeks protested, urging the organizers of the Norwegian Games to return to tradition. As a result, the fire from Greece was still delivered to the opening of the Games, and it was from him that the torch was lit, which was entrusted to the ski jumper.
Torch of the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta (USA)
The 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta was held in the year of the 100th anniversary of the modern Olympic Games. And so the developers of the design of the Olympic torch decided to give back to ancient tradition. A team of specialists from Georgia Tech University worked on the internal device, and designer Malcolm Greer was responsible for the external appearance. It was he who came up with the idea to make a torch in the form of a bunch of reeds. The number of aluminum stems was supposed to symbolize the 26 Summer Olympics since 1896. But several pipes melted, and in the final version there were 22 stems. Also, the shape of the torch referred to the straight lines of classical Greek architecture. The Torch of the Games in Atlanta was the longest in the history of all the Olympics and the only one with a capture in the middle. The right to light the Olympic flame with them at the opening ceremony of the Games was awarded to the legendary Mohammed Ali.
Torch of the 1998 Olympics in Nagano (Japan)
The torch is made in the likeness of traditional Japanese Taimatsu torches, but with some modern touches. It was made entirely of aluminum and burned with propane, and was considered the most environmentally friendly of all made up to that time. The hexagonal shape of the top of the torch symbolizes the snowflake, and the silver color symbolizes winter. The honor of bringing the Olympic flame to the Nagano stadium fell to Briton Chris Moon, who lost an arm and a leg in Mozambique, where he cleared anti-personnel mines. To a flurry of applause, Moon ran through the stadium, despite the fact that instead of one of his legs he had a prosthesis.
Olympic torch 2000 in Sydney (Australia)
When Sydney, Australia won the right to host the Olympics at the 101st session of the IOC, many thought about how long the Olympic torch relay would be. As a result, its length was 17,000 km. The torch with the Olympic flame was delivered on foot, by train, by bicycle, by kayak, by ferry, by plane, on horseback and even under water. The last leg of the journey, scuba divers swam with a torch through the crevices of the Great Barrier Reef. Four years before the start of the games, the Australian Olympic Committee arranged a tender among four dozen local design bureaus and eventually chose Blue Sky Design. The design team was inspired by the Sydney Opera House, the Pacific Ocean and a hunting boomerang. As a result, the torch of the Sydney Olympics turned out to be multi-layered, with each of the layers personifying a separate element: earth, water and fire.
Torch of the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City (USA)
The design of the icicle torch, made of silver and copper with a glass tip, is meant to illustrate the motto of the Salt Lake City Olympics: "Light the fire within you." The tongue of flame, as it were, breaks through the ice. Along with the athletes, relatives of those who died as a result of the tragic events of September 11 in New York participated in the relay.
Torch of the 2004 Olympics in Athens (Greece)
The torch of the Athens Olympics was presented to the public a year before the start of the games. Its creator was the industrial designer Andreas Varotsos, who had previously been involved in the development of office furniture. The main materials from which the torch was made were olive wood and metal. The first was supposed to symbolize the ancient history of Greece, and the second - modernity. The Athenian torch, whose shape resembled a twisted olive leaf, turned out to be very concise and even modest, but this did not bother the representatives of the Greek Olympic Committee. Worse, it turned out that the torch turned out to be technically imperfect: it was repeatedly blown out by the wind during the Olympic torch relay, and to top it all off, the flame went out right in the temple of Hera at the moment of the solemn transfer of the Olympic flame to the president of the organizing committee of the Athens Games, John Angelopoulou-Daskalaki.
Torch of the 2006 Olympics in Turin (Italy)
The famous Italian design firm Pininfarina, which works with automotive giants such as Ferrari, Maserati, Rolls-Royce and Jaguar, decided to try its hand at creating Olympic symbols. The shape of the torch resembles a ski, and the tongues of flame breaking through the holes create the illusion of a fireball. However, despite its sleek design, this torch has been criticized by representatives of various Olympic committees for being too heavy. Many athletes did not feel too comfortable carrying an almost two-kilogram torch.
Torch of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing (China)
For almost a year, a team of designers and technicians has been working on the creation of the Beijing 2008 Olympic torch. Such a responsible task was entrusted to the Lenovo IT company, a well-known computer manufacturer. The torch of the Beijing Games was made in the form of a scroll, because paper is considered one of the great inventions of China. The main colors of the torch were red, symbolizing the triumph of victory, and silver. And arrange it upper part was solved with a pattern of clouds, which is often found in painting and interior elements in China. The torch of the 2008 Olympics has become one of the most technologically advanced and environmentally friendly in history and has even been called the Cloud of Hope. It was made of an alloy of aluminum and magnesium, and propane was used as fuel, which does not pollute the atmosphere during combustion and does not harm the lungs of athletes.
Torch of the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver (Canada)
This torch was designed by artists from vehicle manufacturer Bombardier and Hudson's Bay Company. Its length is 94.5 cm, and its weight is 1.6 kg. The shape of the torch is reminiscent of ski tracks in the snow, as well as the Canadian landscape. The side burn holes are carved in the shape of a maple leaf. On a snow-white torch the emblem of the Olympic Games in Vancouver - Inukshuk is depicted. Inukshuk is a heap of stones in the shape of a man with arms outstretched to the sides. The indigenous inhabitants of the region, the Inuit, installed them as road signs.
Dozens of engineers and designers have been developing and testing a far from simple torch device for two years. I had to create a special fuel (a mixture of propane and isobutane), which would burn at low temperatures. The special design of the air sampling holes forms a flame in the form of a developing flag.
Torch of the 2012 London Olympics (UK)
Exactly 100 days before the start of the London Olympics, the torch of the upcoming Games was presented to the public. Its development was entrusted to the residents of the British capital - designers Edward Barber and Jay Osgerby. Before starting work, each of them received an 80-page description of the requirements with images of all pre-existing Olympic torch models. For games in London, designers came up with a triangular torch made of aluminum alloy. The choice of material managed to simultaneously ensure its lightness and strength, and the three faces symbolized not only the words of the Olympic motto "Faster, higher, stronger", but also the third Olympics in London. In addition, the perforation applied to the torch turned out to be original: 8000 round holes symbolize the number of torchbearers who took part in the Olympic torch relay.
Now back to our 2014 torch.
inner fire
The "Feather of the Firebird" is only the outer shell. The fuel filling was developed by specialists from a large Russian defense enterprise - the Krasnoyarsk Machine-Building Plant, Krasmash. The combustion system consists of three main parts: a gas cylinder, a tap and an evaporator burner.
Rocket engineers could use pure industrial propane, which burns well and has a rather low boiling point of -42°C, which is important in the conditions of the Russian winter. However, pure propane has an octane rating of 100 units, is explosive and cannot be used for safety reasons. Therefore, a mixture of propane and butane in a safe ratio of 80:20 was chosen. With this liquefied mixture, a cylinder specially designed to fit the shape of the body, the pressure in which is 12 atm, is filled to half its volume.
60 g of gas is enough for about 8-10 minutes of burning. Again, for safety reasons, gas is taken from the liquid fraction (the intake tube is lowered to the bottom of the cylinder). It would seem that it is more convenient to work with the gaseous fraction - the system maintains an almost constant pressure, and the flame is very stable.
But if such a torch is sharply tilted or turned over, the liquid intake will “overwhelm” and, as a result, the combustion system will be interrupted. Nevertheless, the torch of the Moscow Olympic Games in 1980 was made just like that! The fact is that then the torchbearers were professional athletes who were ordered
keep the torch strictly upright, and they strictly observed this rule. By the way, out of more than 6,000 Moscow torches, only 36 went out, which, compared to other Olympiads, is an excellent indicator.
clear flame
When the needle valve is opened, the gas through the pipeline through the first jet (calibrated hole for supplying a strictly defined amount of fuel) enters the evaporator tube, spirally wound on the burner body, where, heating up, it passes into a gaseous state. And then, through another jet, the gas bursts out in a clear flame.
But not too clear: the mixture must be re-enriched with combustible gas. In this case, carbon particles (simply speaking, soot) are formed in the flame, which glow with yellow light, making the fire powerful and clearly visible. However, it is important to strike a balance: such a flame is less stable than a completely burning mixture. The burner itself may work beautifully, but the torch body severely restricts airflow.
If you make holes in the lower part of the body, the torch will resemble a blowtorch, fuel consumption will increase dramatically, and the flame itself will be barely noticeable - transparent blue. Let's make holes on the sides of the hull - we will also get an almost invisible flame, the combustion temperature of which is very high with a strong side wind, which leads to the risk of melting the hull elements. To avoid this, the Krasmash engineers placed the burner at the bottom of a special refractory glass, and wound a nichrome thread around its perimeter.
When the torch burns, the thread acts as a spiral for incandescent ignition - it becomes red-hot and ignites the gas-air mixture if the flame is “torn off” by a strong gust of wind.
It would seem that everything is provided, checked, tested. But the devil, as you know, is in the details.
Debriefing
October 6, 2013 the weather was not bad. The sun often winked from behind the clouds, a weak breeze was blowing, only 1 m/s. And yet the torch went out. Right under the walls of the Kremlin, at the 20th second of the race, in the hands of the 17-time world champion in diving Shavarsh Karapetyan. This case received a special resonance also because an employee of the FSO who happened to be nearby “lighted up” the extinguished torch - and not with the Olympic flame from a special icon lamp, but with an ordinary lighter.
(By the way, this was not the first such case in history: in 1976 in Montreal, a powerful gust of wind with rain extinguished not even the torch, but the Olympic flame in the stadium bowl, and a technician who happened to be nearby, without thinking twice, set it on fire with an ordinary lighter. Later, of course, , to observe the tradition, the fire was extinguished and re-lit from the "original", as in Moscow). And this was only the beginning: over the next two days, the “Firebird feather” had to be “lit up” four times from a special lamp with the Olympic flame.
The reason was found pretty quickly. For the correct combustion process, it is necessary to completely open the gas supply channel. Otherwise, a non-free channel may affect the stability of the flame. But the valve needle has a small play in the clip that compresses it and can freely rotate around the longitudinal axis. This was done on purpose so as not to deform the edges of the locked channel.
On the other hand, it is necessary that the valve opens when turning a quarter of a turn, and further turn is limited by a stop. This is done to ensure the ergonomics of the torch. Turning the faucet more than 90 degrees is simply inconvenient: you need to twist the brush unnaturally or ask someone for help. As a result, it turned out that when the tap handle is turned a quarter of a turn, the deviation of the needle from the channel does not open it enough. It is clear that at some point the needle may again block the channel! The issue was resolved by fully opening the faucet. As a result, the number of extinguished torches immediately decreased noticeably.
How could the specialists of Krasmash, a powerful enterprise with an impeccable product, make a miscalculation? According to Vladimir Pirozhkov, this is a common part of the routine design work: “According to the conditions of the International Olympic Committee, the torch should burn only once and only with the Olympic flame. That is ... each torch goes to the relay without testing, straight from the assembly line.
But for any machine-building plant (and Krasmash is no exception) to start mass production from scratch without multi-level qualification tests of finished products is nonsense. Any production in any country has a certain experimental percentage of non-standard, it is precisely eliminated during the testing process. According to the results of which, by the way, adjustments are made to the production process in order to reduce this percentage. And the production of torches is completely out of this scheme.
Of course, there was a batch of products designed specifically for testing. This random sample from the series behaved in an ideal way. What they didn’t do with torches: they blew them in a wind tunnel, poured water on them, froze them at -40 ° C, dropped them into a snowdrift - and whatever! Here are such successful specimens. It was forbidden for Krasmash to test the remaining 16,000 products.
Learn from mistakes
The torch of the Olympic flame is the main symbol of any Olympics. Attitude towards him is always emphasized focused. But extinguished torches were at all the Olympic Games, these cases simply did not receive wide publicity. The 2014 Olympic Games in Sochi are covered very widely and brightly, and therefore there may be an impression of serious technical problems. In fact, there is no tragedy in the extinguished torches. “Canadians had a huge problem with the Vancouver Olympic torch,” explains Vladimir Pirozhkov. - It was developed, let me remind you, by the Canadian industrial giant Bombardier.
Of the 7,000 copies produced, 146 went out. And with a strong wind, the flame temperature of the Vancouver torch increased to such an extent that the plastic structural elements began to melt, and later, right in the course of the relay, the developers screwed special refractory shields to the torch. (The first torch began to melt almost right in the hands of Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper, who started the Olympic torch relay. - "PM".) And this, generally speaking, is a normal practice. Over the years of its existence, the International Olympic Committee has developed a condition to consider the situation when the number of extinguished torches does not exceed 5% of their total number as the norm.
The Olympic torch relay is always accompanied by a special team, which carries a light in several lamps, authentic to that which is lit on the Greek Mount Olympus. Extinct torches are lit from it. Our relay race is the longest in history - over 65,000 km. It involved record number torches. In extreme conditions (the North Pole, the Arctic), the torch behaves very reliably. 16,000 pieces were made by Krasmash, of which the number of extinct ones is unlikely to exceed 2%. Given our harsh climatic conditions, this is a very good result.
Mystical fate dominates the Olympic torch builders of all times and peoples, no matter how venerable they may be. It is difficult to doubt the competence of the specialists of Bombardier, the manufacturer of aircraft and railway transport, or the formidable Krasmash. Dozens of Turin torches were also extinguished, although their developer and manufacturer, the world famous company Pininfarina, can design objects more complicated - car bodies for Ferrari, Rolls-Royce and Jaguar. A rational explanation nevertheless exists.
“There are no companies in nature that systematically develop Olympic torches,” states Vladimir Pirozhkov, “and we are very proud of our cooperation with the Sochi 2014 Organizing Committee and the legendary Krasmash factory! – Accordingly, there is no accumulated and recorded experience. Every country has to start from scratch. And it seems that every time engineering thought works in approximately the same way: “Yes, no question! Just think, make a big lighter!”.
And although the technology of the gas burner has indeed been worked out to the smallest detail, as soon as they try to dress it in a shirt of the original case, the fun begins. The story about the issues that our specialists faced in the development of the torch, I am sure, will be useful for future Olympic torch builders.”
