7 Oct 2013

Olympic torch goes out in Kremlin

3:09 pm on 7 October 2013

Russia's Olympic torch relay has got off to a rocky start with the flame briefly going out as one of the torchbearers passed through a Kremlin gate.

The Olympic flame arrived in Moscow from Athens ahead of February's Winter Games in the Black Sea resort of Sochi and was used to light a cauldron on the Kremlin's Red Square.

That flame was used to light the first torch in a brief relay ceremony but things went wrong when the flame passed to the second torchbearer who noticed it had gone out.

An official then stepped in to re-light it with a cigarette lighter.

The original Greek flame remained lit in the Red Square cauldron the entire time.

Officials dismissed the incident as a minor hiccup saying the flame had gone out because the valve of the torch hadn't been fully opened.