Winter Olympics Photo of the Day: Dynamic Cauldrons

The Olympic flame lights up both Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo.

Two athletes jointly hold a torch aloft, standing beneath a tall arch, lighting the ornate spherical Olympic cauldron above them.
Lars Baron / Getty

The torchbearers Deborah Compagnoni and Alberto Tomba light one of two Olympic cauldrons during the opening ceremony of the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics at Piazza Dibona in Milan, Italy, today. The Olympic flame, carried through all 110 provinces in Italy over the past 63 days, has reached its final destinations: a pair of identical cauldrons in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo. The dynamic structures, made of 1,440 aluminum components that expand and contract, hold the flame enclosed in a small container in their center, where it will stay lit until the end of the Games, on February 22.