PARIS: The rector of Notre Dame Cathedral says the Paris landmark is still so fragile that there’s a “50 percent chance” the structure might not be entirely saved, because scaffolding installed before this year’s fire is threatening the vaults of the Gothic monument.
Monsignor Patrick Chauvet said restoration work isn’t likely to begin until 2021 — and described his “heartache” at not being able to celebrate Christmas services inside Notre Dame this year, for the first time since the French Revolution.
“Today it is not out of danger,” he told The Associated Press on the sidelines of Christmas Eve midnight Mass in a nearby church. “It will be out of danger when we take out the remaining scaffolding.”
“Today we can say that there is maybe a 50 percent chance that it will be saved. There is also 50 percent chance of scaffolding falling onto the three vaults, so as you can see the building is still very fragile,” he said.
The 12th-century cathedral was under renovation at the time of the accidental April fire, which destroyed its roof and collapsed its spire. One of the toughest parts of the cleanup effort is cutting down the 50,000 tubes of old scaffolding that crisscrossed the back of the edifice.
“We need to remove completely the scaffolding in order to make the building safe so in 2021 we will probably start the restoration of the cathedral,” Chauvet said. “Once the scaffolding is removed we need to assess the state of the cathedral, the quantity of stones to be removed and replaced.”
He estimated it would take another three years after that to make it safe enough for people to re-enter the cathedral, but that the full restoration will take longer. President Emmanuel Macron has said he wants it rebuilt by 2024, when Paris hosts the Olympics, but experts have questioned whether that time frame is realistic.
Unable to celebrate Christmas in Notre Dame this year, its congregation, clergy and choir decamped to the Saint-Germain l’Auxerrois Church across from the Louvre Museum instead.
Parishioners at Christmas Eve Mass shared sorrow about the fire, but also a feeling of solidarity.
“I remember my mother told me that she was watching TV, and that there was a fire at Notre Dame. I told her ‘it’s not possible,’ and I took my bike, and when I arrived I was crying,” said Jean-Luc Bodam, a Parisian engineer who used to cross town to attend services at the cathedral.
“We are French, we are going to try to rebuild Notre Dame as it was before, because it is a symbol,” he said.
Notre Dame rector: Fragile Paris cathedral might not be saved
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Notre Dame rector: Fragile Paris cathedral might not be saved
- Monsignor Patrick Chauvet said restoration work isn’t likely to begin until 2021
- The 12th-century Notre Dame cathedral was under renovation at the time of the accidental April fire
Germany’s Merz urges ‘peaceful coexistence’ a year after deadly market attack
- The market attack happened during campaigning for legislative elections — one of several carried out by migrants that fed into a fierce debate about immigration and security in Germany
MAGDEBURG, Germany: German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Saturday called for “peaceful coexistence” as the country marked the first anniversary of a deadly car-ramming attack at a Christmas market in eastern Germany.
Merz addressed a church ceremony in the city of Magdeburg, where the December 20, 2024, attack killed six and wounded more than 300 others.
“May we all find, today in this commemoration, comfort and peaceful coexistence, especially as Christmas approaches,” he told those gathered at the Protestant Johanniskirche (St. John’s Church), near the site of the attack.
Germany was still “a country where we show unconditional solidarity — especially when injustice prevails — standing shoulder to shoulder wherever violence erupts,” he added.
While the market reopened on November 20, guarded by armed police and protected by concrete barricades, it remained closed on Saturday out of respect to the victims of last year’s attack.
Saudi man Taleb Jawad Al-Abdulmohsen, 51, is currently on trial for the attack. He has admitted to plowing a rented SUV through the crowd in an attack prosecutors say was inspired by a mix of personal grievances, far-right and anti-Islam views.
Merz’s speech came eight months before regional elections, with the far-right AfD riding high in opinion polls in Saxony-Anhalt state, of which Magdeburg is the capital.
The market attack happened during campaigning for legislative elections — one of several carried out by migrants that fed into a fierce debate about immigration and security in Germany.
On December 13, German police said they had arrested five men suspected of planning a similar vehicle attack on a Christmas market in the southern state of Bavaria.
Police and prosecutors said they had detained an Egyptian, three Moroccans and a Syrian over the alleged plot.
