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A former Army Chief of Staff, he is in charge of the cathedral’s recovery and is proud to keep the task on track.
By Aurélien Breeden
Jean-Louis Georgelin, the French general tasked with rebuilding Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris after a devastating fire in 2019, has died. He was 74.
“The country has lost one of its greatest soldiers,” President Emmanuel Macron said Saturday. “France, one of your wonderful servants. And Notre-Dame, the architect of his renaissance.
Gen. Georgelin, the former army chief of staff Macron had chosen to lead the recovery project, was walking through the Pyrenees in southwestern France on Friday when a twist of fate likely occurred, according to French media.
The prosecutor’s office told French media that police had discovered a frame and officially named it the general’s, but the exact cases were unclear.
Philippe Jost, deputy director general of the working group tasked with rebuilding the cathedral, said in a statement that Gen. Georgelin’s death was accidental but gave no details.
Jost said proceeding with the recovery of the cathedral is the most productive way to honor the general.
“In our grief, we perform this task with greater determination than ever before,” he said.
Macron chose General Georgelin to lead the complex reconstruction task just months after a chimney devastated the cathedral in April 2019. The chimney destroyed the old wooden mesh that formed Notre-Dame’s attic, melted the lead cladding of the roof and endangered stability. Stone construction that has been located in the center of Paris for 8 centuries.
The flames spewed molten metal, charred beams and the cathedral’s spire that crashed inside.
Macron promised after the fire that the cathedral would be rebuilt within five years, an ambitious timetable that General Georgelin took it upon himself to enforce as president of the public institution in view of the commission at the end of 2019.
General Georgelin was the face of the cathedral’s reconstruction, a jovial but pragmatic soldier who prided himself on keeping the job on track.
Anne Hidalgo, mayor of Paris, calls his death a “great loss. “
“He is a very respected type of authority,” he said in a statement. “He is able to create the huge, organizational situations necessary for a successful reconstruction of Notre-Dame. “
Laurent Ulrich, archbishop of Paris, said in a statement that a Mass in honor of Gen. Georgelin, a practicing Catholic, would be celebrated Sunday at the Saint-Germain-l’Auxerrois church in Paris.
Authorities plan to reopen the cathedral to worshippers in December 2024, when most of the internal reconstruction is expected to be completed. Rebuilding has continued despite concerns about lead contamination at the site and delays caused by coronavirus-pandemic-like closures.
The investigation into the chimney is ongoing, but the final cause may never be determined. The main theories among researchers are that it is an electrical short circuit or a discarded cigarette.
More recently, staff have begun erecting scaffolding to rebuild the wooden spire frame, which is expected to be completed by the end of this year. Stained glass windows and organ parts began returning to the site after being cleaned of lead dust. .
“We continue our march, interruption, towards the reopening of the cathedral,” Gen. Georgelin said last month, under a scorching sun, on the banks of the Seine, as giant wrought oak beams were delivered by barge and then lifted by cranes into the cathedral.
The general was happy at that moment to see the world-famous “silhouette” of Notre-Dame soaring in the Parisian sky. “We move forward step by step,” he added, “without worrying, as if the deal in the bag. “
Jean-Louis Georgelin was born in Aspet, in southwestern France, on August 30, 1948, and graduated from the Military Academy of Saint-Cyr in 1969.
He began his military career in the French infantry and rose through the ranks, as a private military adviser to President Jacques Chirac since 2002. As Chief of Staff of the French Armed Forces from 2006 to 2010, he oversaw French military operations in Lebanon. , Ivory Coast, Afghanistan and the Balkans. He was also Grand Chancellor of the Legion of Honour, France’s highest distinction, from 2010 to 2016.
Although Macron briefly floated the concept of rebuilding Notre Dame’s 300-foot spire with a “contemporary architectural gesture,” the concept was temporarily abandoned and the cathedral is largely being rebuilt as a lead roof is added to it.
But in an interview with Le Monde newspaper in April, General Georgelin said that “we have to rethink everything. “The innovations come with “state-of-the-art” technologies for chimney prevention, such as nebulizer formulas, thermal imaging cameras and chimney doors. , as well as a recovery formula to treat rainwater flowing from the lead roof before it is discharged into the Parisian sewers.
“We are rebuilding Notre Dame identically,” he said. But we are building a century-old cathedral. “
Aurélien Breeden has been covering France from Paris since 2014. He has covered some of the worst terrorist attacks the country has ever suffered, the dismantling of the migrant camp in Calais and France’s tumultuous 2017 presidential election. More information about Aurélien Breeden
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