France paid a daylong tribute Thursday to the Paris firefighters who saved the internationally revered Notre Dame Cathedral from collapse and rescued many of its treasures. As the ceremonies took place, construction workers hurriedly secured key sections of the fire-weakened cathedral, including an area above one of its famed rose-shaped windows.
Fire officials warned that the massive cathedral still remains very fragile and extremely dangerous for construction workers and other specialists. On Thursday, workers using a crane were removing some statues to lessen the weight on cathedral's fragile gables, or support walls, and to keep them from falling, since the section lacked the support of the massive timber roof that burned up in Monday's evening's devastating blaze.
Paris City Hall was holding a ceremony in the firefighters' honour later in the day, with a Bach violin concert, two giant banners strung from the monumental city headquarters and readings from Victor Hugo's "The Hunchback of Notre Dame." Among the firefighters being honoured Thursday is Paris fire brigade chaplain Jean-Marc Fournier, who says he was falsely credited with helping salvage the crown of thorns believed to have been worn by Jesus at his crucifixion.
"We knew that the roof was burning, but we didn't really know the intensity," she told reporters. "It was from upstairs that you understood that it was really dramatic. It was very hot and we had to retreat, retreat. It was spreading quickly." The building would have burned to the ground in a "chain-reaction collapse" had firefighters not moved as rapidly as they did to battle the blaze racing through the building, Jose Vaz de Matos, a fire expert with France's Culture Ministry, said Wednesday.
The lack of tourists was a significant concern for neighbourhood merchants. A large swath of the Ile de la Cite is currently inaccessible, with numerous bridges linking it with mainland Paris closed.
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