Fire at Notre Dame

April 15, 2019 11:30 AM

A huge fire has broken out at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. First reports seem to indicate that the fire started at a working site within the church.
posted by CrazyLemonade (17 comments total)

To emphasize, there are a lot of people in the hot-take-verse trying to push the idea of arson (and are making fairly racist claims as to who the arsonists would be), but the fire started in what was clearly an area with a bunch of scaffolding, so unless and until contradictory information comes to light, Occam's razor says this was an accident in an area where work was being done.
posted by tclark at 11:33 AM on April 15, 2019 [9 favorites]

But also, my god, what a heart-rending sight on such a beautiful building.
posted by tclark at 11:34 AM on April 15, 2019 [2 favorites]

Yikes, this is terrible. Such a beautiful building with so much history. I just last night finished reading a huge biography of Napoleon, who was crowned Emperor there.
posted by freecellwizard at 11:34 AM on April 15, 2019 [1 favorite]

My sister is visiting Europe to see my niece, and they just left Paris today. Yesterday they visited the cathedral, and may have attended the very last Mass held there.

Holy shit.
posted by notsnot at 11:34 AM on April 15, 2019 [6 favorites]

My heart is absolutely breaking.
posted by Gray Duck at 11:34 AM on April 15, 2019 [2 favorites]

I really hate this timeline.
posted by aramaic at 11:35 AM on April 15, 2019 [4 favorites]

Officials now say they do not expect to extinguish the fire before it completely consumes the building's frame. This is horrifying.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:35 AM on April 15, 2019 [3 favorites]

Quelle triste nouvelle :'(

French-language live blogs:
Le Monde
Le Parisien
Le Figaro
France 24

France 24 is also covering it via their YouTube 24/7 streaming channel.

English-language live blogs:
France 24, English
BBC
Guardian
posted by andrewesque at 11:35 AM on April 15, 2019 [5 favorites]

I'm flashing back to the Glasgow School of Art fire(s). Surely there needs to be a serious rethink of how these irreplaceable treasures are protected during construction work.
posted by Preserver at 11:35 AM on April 15, 2019 [1 favorite]

the moment the cathedral spire fell. This is so sad. I’ve always wanted to visit but have yet to travel to France.
posted by CrazyLemonade at 11:36 AM on April 15, 2019 [4 favorites]

I’ve been off the news all day, and only now turned on NPR and this is the first thing I heard. I gutted. It’s just horrible.
posted by Thorzdad at 11:37 AM on April 15, 2019

His cathedral was enough for him. It was peopled with marble figures of kings, saints and bishops who at least did not laugh in his face and looked at him with only tranquillity and benevolence. The other statues, those of monsters and demons, had no hatred for him – he resembled them too closely for that. It was rather the rest of mankind that they jeered at. The saints were his friends and blessed him; the monsters were his friends and kept watch over him. He would sometimes spend whole hours crouched before one of the statues in solitary conversation with it. If anyone came upon him then he would run away like a lover surprised during a serenade.”
― Victor Hugo, The Hunchback of Notre-Dame

.
posted by Fizz at 11:39 AM on April 15, 2019 [11 favorites]

That's a shame, I guess. Kind of feels fitting given modern society, though.
posted by codacorolla at 11:40 AM on April 15, 2019

This is the saddest thing I have ever seen.
posted by Capt. Renault at 11:40 AM on April 15, 2019

Not a restoration professional, but: given it’s Paris, and given it’s Nôtre-Dame, is there any chance at all that Macron is not going to make its plus-que-perfect restoration the crowning achievement of his national reign?
posted by progosk at 11:40 AM on April 15, 2019

there are a lot of people in the hot-take-verse trying to push the idea of arson (and are making fairly racist claims as to who the arsonists would be)

On a completely unrelated note:
The NYPD Counterterrorism unit has for some reason decided to weigh in on the matter
posted by Atom Eyes at 11:41 AM on April 15, 2019

Officials now say they do not expect to extinguish the fire before it completely consumes the building's frame. This is horrifying.

I saw this quote, at second-hand, but do not have its original source:

CBC: Notre Dame spokesman Andre Finot tells French media the entire wooden interior of the 12th-century landmark is burning and likely to be destroyed: 'Nothing will remain from the frame.'
posted by thelonius at 11:41 AM on April 15, 2019