DHAKA: Two Russian cosmonauts will take the torch for the Sochi Winter Olympics on its first historic spacewalk, as part of efforts to showcase next year’s games in Russia.

Oleg Kotov and Sergei Ryazansky are scheduled to take the unlit version of the torch on a spacewalk at 1430 GMT, reports the BBC.

The pair say the torch will spend up to five hours in open space.

A three-man crew took the torch to the International Space Station on a Russian Soyuz rocket on Thursday.

The rocket blasted off from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan crewed by three cosmonauts, Russia’s Mikhail Tyurin, American Rick Mastracchio and Koichi Wakata from Japan.

The crew handed the Olympic symbol to Kotov and Ryazansky, who were already on the orbiting station ahead of Saturday’s spacewalk.

BDST: 2046 HRS, NOV 09, 2013
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