The Torch, which was unlit for safety reasons, has already been in space for two days after a rocket, carrying Russian commander Mikhail Tyurin along with Japan's Koichi Wakata and the United States Richard Mastracchio, was successfully launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Thursday (November 7).

Until this afternoon the Torch had remained within the space station as two more cosmonaut's, Oleg Kotov and Sergei Ryazansky, who have each already been in Space for over a month, prepared for the launch. 

At approximately 6:40pm Moscow time the airlock on the "Pirs Module" of the Station opened to allow the Torch out for an hour long photo session.

Kotov initially carried the Torch and followed behind Ryazansky, carrying filming equipment, as they embarked on a tour of the entire station which broadcast live on television.

The Torch embarks on its first spacewalk around the International Space Station in the hands of Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kotov


Kotov and Ryazansky also tried their hands as space Torchbearers by passingit between each other as they completed what the organisers described as a "symbolic stage" of the Relay which gave it a "truly cosmic scale".

They made sure the Torch was attached to their spacesuits throughout as they orbited the Earth at an estimated speed of eight kilometers per second.

The Torch spent more than an hour in open space but was not lit in orbit because combustion is impossible in open space, and safety regulations strictly prohibit open flame on board the International Space Station.

The space leg of the Relay was taking place simultaneously with the earth version with the "other" Olympic flame arriving in Yakutsk, the capital city of Sakha region, where it will be transported by dog and reindeer sleighs.

The Space Torch, meanwhile, will remain in orbit for five days.

Mikhail Tyurin commanded the rocket which brought the Torch to the International Space Station...two days before the spacewalk




Another Russian Fyodor Yurchikhin, who along with the team that completed most of the work on board the International Space Station, will bring the Torch back to Earth spacecraft and immediately give it to representatives of Sochi 2014 upon exiting the capsule.

At the end of mammoth four month journey, the very same space Torch will light the Cauldron in the Olympic Stadium, to mark the start of the Winter Olympics in Sochi at the Opening Ceremony on February 7.