"It's a bit like my baby, our baby," Delphine Moulin, Paris 2024 director of celebration, told Reuters on Friday amid the sounds of metal being cut, bent, polished and sprayed with micro-particles of steel. You can see that it's different from the usually flared shape of the Olympic torch," Moulin added. You don't use the same kind of steel to make rails and to make this torch," ArcelorMittal France president Eric Niedziela said. Paris 2024 officials and ArcelorMittal have been tight-lipped on the budget of the torches' fabrication, declining to give an estimate of the overall cost. The Paris 2024 flame will be lit on April 16 in Ancient Olympia and will remain in the country for about a week before a handover ceremony in Athens and the start of its journey to France.

---

Persons: Delphine Moulin, Guy Degrenne, Moulin, ArcelorMittal's Franck Wasilewski, Eric Niedziela, Julien Pretot, Ed Osmond Organizations: Paris, Paralympic Games, ArcelorMittal, Reuters, Thomson Locations: Vire, France, Paris, Normandy, Greece, Ancient Olympia, Athens