The first 8 oaks were selected today in the Bercé forest, in the Sarthe (north-western region of France) to be used in the reconstruction of part of the Notre-Dame spire in Paris.
In total, a thousand oaks from all regions of France were
offered for the reconstruction of the cathedral
and in particular to redo the skeleton of the spire of the architect Viollet-le-Duc,
destroyed in the fire of 15 April 2019
, as well as to the transept and adjacent beams.
To launch the initiative, the Minister of Agriculture Julien Denormandie and that of Culture, Roselyne Bachelot, symbolically
applied a plaque on one of the plants
, with the words "tree number 1".
"It is a construction site that covers the whole of France - said General Jean-Louis Georgelin, who as president of the public body in charge of securing and restoring Notre-Dame - will make it possible to guarantee the safety of the cathedral for 8-10 centuries ".
All the regions of France have donated oaks
for this enterprise, the state has offered 355 trees from the plots managed by the National Forestry Authority.
A thousand trees will have to be cut down by the end of March in order to be sawn and prepared.
Then they will have to wait a period of 12-18 months to reach a humidity of less than 30%.
With the preparation of the wood,
the reconstruction phase of
Notre-Dame
begins
,
which should start next autumn and which will allow the reopening of the cathedral of Paris in April 2024, as planned by the President of the Republic, Emmanuel Macron.
The safety phase is currently nearing completion.