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January 07, 2001
Former resident designed Olympic cauldron
PH grad keeps secret until unveiling Tuesday
By David Persons
DavidPersons@coloradoan.com
    It might be easier to find out where Osama bin Laden is hiding than to discover the shape of the cauldron that will hold the Olympic flame for the 2002 Winter Games.
    The Salt Lake Organizing Committee, or SLOC, has kept the final design of the fire-and-ice-themed cauldron shrouded in secrecy for months.
    Jim Doyle, a former Fort Collins resident and a graduate of Poudre High School, knows the secrets. He was the cauldron's lead designer.
    But he's not talking either, at least not yet.
    SLOC officials wanted to keep a lid on the cauldron's design until the opening ceremony Feb. 8.
    But that's not going to be possible.
    Since it is going to require a great deal of onsite construction this weekend, SLOC officials scheduled a press conference Tuesday to unveil the cauldron, which will sit atop a 150-foot steel trellis at the south end of the University of Utah's Rice-Eccles Stadium.
    Doyle is director of technical resources for WET Design, a Universal City, Calif.-based firm, that created the cauldron.
    Doyle, 46, said he couldn't talk specifically about the cauldron's size, its cost or exact shape. But he did say that it took eight months to design.
    "It was so complicated that we had to build it in 3D software," said Doyle, who graduated from Poudre High School in 1973. "And even then, it took us three to four months to get it just right.
    "The good thing about that software ... is that you can solve your mistakes in a couple days. It saves a lot of shop time, too."
    Doyle said once the design was finished, a Salt Lake City roller coaster company - Aerodynamics - was contracted to do the structural engineering and fabrication work.
    Although Doyle can't reveal anything about the cauldron's design, he did say the cauldron, when lit, would be visible throughout the Salt Lake Valley.
    Doyle, in an interview with the Salt Lake Tribune last week, said: "We've tried to build a structure that is aesthetically pleasing on its own. But, its intent is to support the Olympic flame. We didn't just want a bowl on fire. We were looking for something that would display the flame more fully - like a chalice made to hold something beautiful and important."
    Although Doyle said "fire as an art form is what I do," he won an Academy Award in 1992 for developing a fog-making system for the movie industry.
    His firm, WET Design, is probably best known for designing the fire-and-water volcano at the Mirage Hotel in Las Vegas and the $40 million water fountains outside the Bellagio Hotel, also in Las Vegas.

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