Indiana organ donor to carry Olympic torch

NECN.com

EAST CHICAGO, Ind. (AP) — The souvenir Angel Alvarez will bring home from his trip to London is bigger than a key chain or a snow globe.

And it's flammable.

The 38-year-old Hammond man has been tapped as one of 8,000 people to carry the Olympic flame in a relay that began in mid-May and will end at the start of the Olympic Games on July 27 in London.

He gets to keep the torch.

Alvarez donated a kidney in 2010 to his ArcelorMittal co-worker Daniel Kniefel, a Hobart man who is his union brother through United Steel Workers Local 1011.

Both are in good health, and doctors cleared Alvarez for this level of physical activity.

His selfless story impressed company officials, and he was one of four employees chosen for the torch relay. Thousands of entries were submitted, said Sunny Oh, external communications specialist with ArcelorMittal.

Alvarez, a known jokester, thought the tables were turned when he heard he was named a torch bearer.

"I was excited, but it was hard to believe," he said. "For a day or two, I thought my co-workers were playing a joke."

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