She began her journey this Tuesday morning, passing from the hands of the high priestess of Hera to those of the Olympic rowing champion Stefanos Ntouskos then the former French swimmer Laure Manaudou. Lit on the ancient site of Olympia, the flame of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games will now travel across Greece for eleven days, before boarding the sailboat Belem, reaching France and Marseille, and ending its journey in the capital French on Friday July 26 for the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. A long journey, where he will have to resist a natural adversary: the wind.
Because the idea of the torch relay is precisely that the Olympic fire never goes out. The flame is powered by a gas, propane, here called biopropane because it is ecological and renewable. And the torch, designed by designer Mathieu Lehanneur and manufactured by the Arcelor Mittal company, underwent tests to verify its ability to withstand possible gusts. This Tuesday morning, in Olympia, we saw the sacred fire bending under the effect of the wind. But without ever disappearing.
The object has been subjected to numerous tests, and the flame can “withstand winds of 100 km/h”, assures France Info the deputy director of the torch relay, Grégory Murac. “We worked with catalytic systems, the same as those used by mountaineers who have to heat a meal at 4,000 m,” emphasizes Mathieu Lehanneur.
In the past, the Olympic flame has not always been able to resist the wind. In January 1968, gusts from the Sancy massif, in Auvergne, extinguished it twice on its way to Grenoble for the Olympics, reports The mountain. More recently, the wind also blew the flame during the relay of the London Games in 2012 and that of Athens in 2004.
But these incidents are planned for in the system surrounding the Olympic torch relay. The original fire lit at Olympia, contained in lanterns kept under cover, follows the torchbearers throughout the route. This allows the guardians of the flame to rekindle it if necessary. And to allow the Greek flames to reach, one way or another, all the way to Paris this summer.
