Russia 'plays' the Olympic torch on the universe

The Russian Federal Space Agency said on June 24 that the country will bring the Olympic torch to the International Space Station (ISS) in November to start the 2014 Winter Olympics program.

This will be the first time the Olympic torch is brought out of the Earth's atmosphere. The international opinion also judged that this was Russia's "play to play" opening for the 2014 Olympic Games, which opened on February 7, 2014 in the city of Sochi, located on the Black Sea coast of the country.

Former astronaut Alexei Leonov (left) transfers the torch to Mikhail Tyurin, the head of the Soyuz (right).(Photo: Internet)

Russian Olympic Committee President Dmitry Chernyshenko said: 'The two astronauts Oleg Kotov and Sergei Ryzansky will bring the 2014 Sochi torch to outer space. This will go into the history of the Olympics and for international friends to see our determination to win. '

On the same day, Director of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) Vladimir Popovkin handed the torch to 79-year-old astronaut Alexei Leonov - the world's first astronaut to walk in space.

Later, Alexei turned the torch back to Mikhail Tyurin, the Soyuz spacecraft chief, to bring it to ISS. Finally, the torch will be brought back to Earth by the astronaut Fyodor Yurchikhin, currently working on ISS.

'For safety reasons, we will not light the torch,' said Roscosmos director.

To be lit up at the opening of the Olympics, the Sochi 2014 torch will also make a 65,000km journey on many vehicles such as airplanes, cars, ships and reindeer vehicles.