The Olympic Torch Is Going To Ooooouter Spaaaaaaaaace

Gee, this is swell, no? Fire in space! Olympic fire in space! Space men taking Olympic fire into space!

Via NASA:

Expedition 38 Flight Engineer Koichi Wakata of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, left, Soyuz Commander Mikhail Tyurin of Roscosmos, and Flight Engineer Rick Mastracchio of NASA, right, smile and wave as they hold an Olympic torch that will be flown with them to the International Space Station, during a press conference held Wed., Nov. 6, at the Cosmonaut hotel in Baikonur, Kazakhstan. On Sat., Nov. 9, the Olympic torch will be carried on a spacewalk outside the space station. The torch — which returns to Earth aboard another Soyuz on Sun., Nov. 10 with Flight Engineers Karen Nyberg and Luca Parmitano and Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin — will light the flame at the opening of the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in Sochi, Russia.

Oh, right. Russia. The country that likes to smear queers and which sends people to Siberian prison camps for playing music. Yeah, let's all kick it at Russia's party and pretend nothing's wrong.

Spacewalk blah blah outer space flame yay. Also, human rights afterthought.

Expedition 38 Crew With Olympic Torch [NASA.gov]

Photo credit: NASA