By staff reporter Wang Wei

The whole of China remains spellbound by the moment when Li Ning, former gymnast and now successful entrepreneur, lit the cauldron at the end of the Beijing Olympic Opening Ceremony. At a press conference on August 12, the Shougang Group resolved the mystery of how the main torch tower suddenly appeared in the Bird's Nest stadium.

The press conference was held on August 12, 2008 to unveil details of the construction and installation of the Beijing Olympics main torch tower. [Wang Wei/China.org.cn]

According to Wang Wenli, Party chief and chairman of the Beijing Shougang Construction Group, Shougang's efforts to keep the secret guaranteed an astonishing surprise for the whole world.

The ceremony featured two sets of images implying "heaven and earth as a unit": the one on the earth documented China's splendid 5,000-year culture; that above circling the Bird's Nest represented the route of the torch relay starting from Athens, continuing throughout the world, and ending in Beijing's Bird's Nest stadium. This long image finally focused on a cauldron, the anticipated focus of the evening. The main torch tower, 32 meters high and weighing 45 tons, was not yet in place at 10:24 PM when the athletes began to enter the stadium.

Zhu Baozhen, deputy general manager of the Beijing Shougang Construction Group, explained that the main torch tower is set at a point north by east 12 degrees. The installation project, called the "TS" project of the Beijing Olympic Opening and Closing Ceremonies, began on January 1, 2008, only seven days after Shougang was assigned the task by the Beijing Organizing Committee for the Games of the XXIX Olympiad (BOCOG). Seven months of effort came to an end with the last impressive scene, witnessed by almost 100,000 audience in the stadium as well as over four billion all around the world.