OGDEN — One of the biggest mementos of the 2002 Winter Games, the railroad flatcar that carried the Olympic flame 3,200 miles through 11 states has settled into its new home at Ogden's Union Station.
The 60-foot-long brightly colored flatcar with the Olympics logo on one end and the torch caldron on the other is on long-term loan to the Utah State Railroad Museum. It sits in the Spencer S. and Hope Fox Eccles Rail Center, a covered area south of Union Station that contains engines and rail cars significant in Utah's railroad history.
Executive Director Bob Geier said it is fitting that the torch car is displayed in the Eccles Rail Center because Spencer F. Eccles and his family had much to do with bringing the Olympics to Utah.
The car originally was built to carry the Olympic flame around the nation for the 1996 Atlanta Summer Games. Union Pacific repainted it for the 2002 Winter Games.
A large caldron on the car burned a propane-fed flame up to 4 feet high. A curtain of air surrounded the flame and kept it from going out as the car sped up to 70 mph down the tracks.
Union Pacific has stored the car in its Salt Lake yard for the past year and reserves the right to call the car back up for another Olympics run, although it is unlikely the United States will host another Olympics for many years.
Ogden's historic Union Station is open Monday through Saturday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and closed Sundays during the winter.