With 31 days until the Opening Ceremony, SLOC unveiled the Olympic Cauldron at a press conference Tuesday. The cauldron will house the Olympic Flame during the Games and serve as an Olympic legacy to the U forever.

Immediately south of the Rice-Eccles Stadium, the cauldron rises 130 feet into the air. When lit, the flame will reach 24 feet above that.

Constructed with triangular shaped blue glass representing ice, the cauldron took 18 months to design and build, and cost about $2 million, according to Mark Fuller of Wet Design, the company which designed it. Arrow Dynamics, Inc., a company that builds roller coasters, built the 40,0000 pound structure in Clearfield, Utah.

The cauldron’s design fits three paradigms of the 2002 Games, said Scott Givens, Salt Lake Organizing Committee creative director. It is angular (just like the snow-flake logo), it contains fire and ice and it symbolizes the Salt Lake 2002 theme, “Light the Fire Within.”

“The Olympic Cauldron will inspire every athlete, every volunteer and every spectator at the Salt Lake 2002 Games,” said Mitt Romney, SLOC president and CEO. Romney and others spoke to a group of reporters from more than 30 national and international media agencies who attended the event.