With the Olympic Torch for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics in
a six-hour sprint to the International Space Station, is this just a prelude
for an eventual “Space Olympics”?
By: Ringo Bones
After blasting off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in
Kazakhstan Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin, together with NASA astronaut Rick
Mastracchio and Koichi Wakata of Japan will be carrying the Olympic Torch
slated for the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics up to the low-Earth orbit of the
International Space Station for a first-ever space-walk with the Olympic Torch
in a literally out-of-this world venue. Even though the Olympic Torch will be
tethered for safety reasons to whomever be carrying it for an EVA
(extra-vehicular activity – i.e. space-walk) this Saturday, it would be the
first time ever in the history of the Olympic Games that the torch has taken an
“out-of-this –world-route” en route to its venue for the opening ceremonies of
the next year’s Winter Olympic Games. But will it also signal for a first ever
“Space Olympics”?
Imagine new legitimate Olympic events like “Weightless
Rhythmic Gymnastics” of “Weightless Wrestling” or any other Olympic games
performed in the weightless environment of low Earth orbit like that of the
International Space Station. Would the launching of the Olympic torch for a
space-walk eventually inspire the beginnings of the “Space Olympiad”?
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