NOTRE DAME CATHEDRAL
the "notre dame" cathedral, located on a little island in the river seine, is the center piece of the countless features of paris.
by the way, from 1980 to 1995 i lived in mannheim/germany, which had a direct train to paris and back, so it was easy to go there. yes, the eiffel tower was the largest monument to see -
yet for me "notre dame" was most special.
the following memo about this certainly famous architecture comes in 2 sections - for a reason.
this mighty "house of god" sits right beside the river seine, in the very center of the city of paris.
it is indeed a very large building, as its facade shows - and so is the immense main hall of this church.
it also has a significant organ, with several thousand pipes, placed in front of a large window.
the construction of the cathedral, replacing earlier churches at this location, in gothic style, began in 1160 a.d. the building has two towers. the size (length, width, hight) is listed in this graph.
this enormous, and 800 years old, building has always needed, and got, repairs - in parts of considerable extent. and so it would have gone on for year after year - -
but in 2019 things changed dramatically:
on april 15, at 18:15, under the cathedrals roof a fire broke out, and gained size and strength very quickly. in spite of enormous efforts of the fire brigades eventually most of the roof was destroyed, and the very large spire, located in the middle of the roof, then collapsed completely.
the upper walls of the building were severely damaged. yet fortunately the stone-vaulted ceiling hold most of the collapsed roof, which reduced the impact on the inner areas. nevertheless, parts of the organ, one glass window and even sections of the towers had bad impacts.
intense research about what had induced the fire, and why it could not been beaten for quite some time, identified the causation, as well as shortcomings in the cathedrals alarm system.
the citizens of france, and very many people in the world, were shocked when they saw the scaring pictures in their television news. for some hours it was widely feared that eventually the whole building would collapse - but the solid stone walls did hold, just.
the french president, emmanuel macron, went to the cathedral on the evening of the event, and declared that the government would do everything possible to restore it - - within 5 years!
obviously this is a huge task - in logistic, financial and political terms. the first agenda was to check and repair the main structure of the building, as well as the windows. this was mostly finished in mid-2022. the second agenda, under way now, is to rebuild the roof and finally the cathedrals spire - which is not only architecture, it is also a symbol.
this essay shall end with a picture of one of the cathedrals glass windows, the large "north rose", created in 1250, about 12m in diameter - it is a very colourful unique architecture.
