Eternal flame

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Eternal Flame is also a single released by The Bangles in 1989, and covered by Atomic Kitten in 2001.

An eternal flame monument

An eternal flame is a flame or torch that burns constantly, fed by a measured supply of propane gas or natural gas. It is most often used as a symbol to acknowledge and remember a person or event of national significance, or a group of brave and noble people connected to some event, or even a laudable goal such as international peace.

The eternal flame to commemorate President Kennedy in the United States in 1963 was the first time in the world that an individual person was given such an honor. Henceforward, eternal flames would be designated more frequently around the world to honor the loss of persons of great significance, in addition to major tragic events.

Eternal flames exist in nature as well, as byproducts of natural gas deposits leaking through the ground.

Symbolic eternal flames around the world

The Bible commands that "The fire shall ever be burning upon the altar; it shall never go out", regarding the altar of the Tabernacle. (Leviticus 6:13, KJV);
The eternal flame under the archway at the Arc de Triomphe in Paris, France, which has burned continuously since 1921, in memory of all who died in World War I;
The eternal flame at the square in downtown Decatur, Georgia, for the Korean War, World War II and the Vietnam War;
The eternal flame at the King Center in Atlanta, Georgia, for assassinated civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr.;
The eternal flame at Rabin Square, Tel Aviv, Israel, for assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin;
The John F. Kennedy Eternal Flame, in Arlington National Cemetery, Virginia, lit by Jacqueline Kennedy on November 25, 1963 during the assassinated president's state funeral;
The eternal flame burning at Raj Ghat, New Delhi, India, in memory of Mahatma Gandhi;
The eternal flame at the Gettysburg Battlefield, Pennsylvania, in memory of the dead of the American Civil War, first lit by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1938;
The eternal flame at Yad Vashem, the national Holocaust-Memorial of Israel in Jerusalem;
The eternal flame at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C., first lit in 1993 by President Clinton and noted Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel;
The eternal flame at Ground Zero, New York City, New York, lit by Mayor Michael Bloomberg on the first anniversary of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks upon the financial district of the city.
The eternal flame at Shanksville, Pennsylvania, to honour the pilots and passengers aboard United Flight 93 on 9-11 in their efforts to thwart the hijacking;
The eternal flame at Honolulu, Hawaii, to honour victims of 9-11;
The eternal flame at Madonna del Ghisallo in Italy, for all cyclists who have died;
The eternal flame at the grave of Elvis Presley at his home "Graceland" in Memphis, Tennessee;
The Olympic Flame is a kind of eternal flame which is kept lit throughout the Olympic Games;

The Peace Tower in view on Parliament Hill

The eternal flame atop the Prayer Tower on the campus of ORU, Oklahoma, which represents the baptism of the Holy Spirit;
The eternal flame at a Buddhist tomb in Nara, Japan, which has been burning for over 1100 years;
The eternal flame at the Newport News Victory Arch in Virginia, commemorating American servicemen and women;
The eternal flame that was kept burning in the inner hearth of the Temple of Delphic Apollo at Delphi in Greece;
The eternal flame burning at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in the Alexander Garden in Moscow, Russia, to honour the dead of the Great Patriotic War;
The eternal flame unveiled in late 2005 in India's Andaman and Nicobar Islands to remember the victims of the 2004 Asian Tsunami;
The eternal flame at Budapest, Hungary, in Kossuth Square commemorating the revolutionaries of the 1956 uprising against control by the Soviet Union;
The University of California, Santa Barbara houses an eternal flame;
The eternal flame at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in Japan, to remain lit until all nuclear weapons in the world are abolished;
The eternal flame at the Peace Palace in The Hague, Netherlands;
The eternal flame lit in 1987 at a War Memorial in Bowman, South Carolina, in honor and memory of the community's residents who died in World War I, World War II, and the Vietnam War.
There is an eternal flame outside of the Peace Tower in Ottawa, Canada, with the shields of each of the Provinces and Territories. This is called the Centennial Flame.
An eternal flame marks the centre of the Armenian Genocide Memorial.

Natural eternal flames

The Eternal Flame Falls can be found in the Shale Creek Preserve in New York.
There is an area producing natural spontaneous flames in Olympos National Park in Turkey.
There is an eternal flame in Guanziling, Taiwan, as a result of methane gas.

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