Rio 2016 Olympic flame lit in Olympia

Saturday, April 23, 2016

A little over 100 days before the scheduled start of the 2016 Summer Olympics, on Thursday the Olympic flame was ignited in a ceremony at the temple of Hera in Olympia, Greece. Actress Katerina Lehu played the role of priestess accompanied by fourteen virgins, lighting the flame at solar noon using sunlight focused by a parabolic mirror.

After lighting the "sacred fire" Lehu passed it to its first bearer, gymnast Lefteris Petrunias. According to El País, another torchbearer is to be a Syrian refugee, bearing it in the Eleonas refugee camp.

International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach said the lighting ceremony was writing history, and the Olympic Games would bring a message of hope in difficult times to Brazil and to the whole world. Over six days, the Olympic torch is to pass through more than 2000 kilometers of Greek territory, going through Marathon and the island of Corfu. This part of the ride ends at the Panathinaiko Stadium in Athens, site of the first modern Games of the Olympiad.

Subsequently, the flame travels by plane to the Olympic Museum in Lausanne where it is to stay for a week. Later, on May 2, it is to be moved to Brasilia. The relay trip of the Olympic flame from Olympia to the Olympic site was introduced by Carl Diem in the Berlin 1936 Games.

Have an opinion on this story? Share it!

Sources

This is a complete or partial translation of the article "La llama olímpica de Río 2016 es encendida en Olimpia", from the español language Wikinews.

Carlos Arribas. "La llama de Río arde ya en Olimpia" — El País, April 21, 2016 (Spanish)
"Grecia encendió la llama olímpica rumbo a los Juegos de Río 2016" — Infobae, April 21, 2016 (Spanish)

Share this:

This page is archived, and is no longer publicly editable.

Articles presented on Wikinews reflect the specific time at which they were written and published, and do not attempt to encompass events or knowledge which occur or become known after their publication.

Got a correction? Add the template {{editprotected}} to the talk page along with your corrections, and it will be brought to the attention of the administrators.

Please note that due to our archival policy, we will not alter or update the content of articles that are archived, but will only accept requests to make grammatical and formatting corrections.

Note that some listed sources or external links may no longer be available online due to age.

The text of this article is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License