"It is a great pride to have two oaks chosen here in Vélizy (Hauts-de-Seine) to rebuild Notre-Dame de Paris", boasts Pascal Thévenot, mayor of the town which borders the national forest of Meudon.
Around 9 am this Thursday, the team of loggers from the National Forestry Office meets at the Ursine roundabout, less than 100 meters where the first oak of the morning must be felled.
Chainsaws in hand, these men of the woods who maintain our forests on a daily basis are heading straight for their goal, with a hurry, their eyes sweeping the treetops to check that the wind, which has been blowing hard for several hours, wants well give them an hour of respite.
“It's a matter of security.
We want to avoid strong gusts during the felling.
There, the weather calms down a bit.
So we don't hang around, ”explains Tadusz Paczkowski, head of the forestry unit at the ONF.
READ ALSO>
Notre-Dame de Paris: we take stock of the future site of the square
One of them grabs a ladder to go up and hang around the trunk marked with the letters ND in orange paint, a cable connected to a tractor that will help bring down this 150-year-old oak tree.
After several minutes of chainsaw cuts and nicks, the 27-meter-high oak crown wobbles and falls heavily on the right side.
Once the branches and nodes have been pruned, the log (the entire trunk stripped of its branches) is transported to the edge of the forest, where it will be stored for two months before leaving for the sawmill.
The same operation is repeated for the second oak.
“These are very complex and difficult cuts, especially in urban areas.
We put our best NFB lumberjacks on the spot.
These are also the same ones who will cut down the other oaks selected in the west of Ile-de-France.
And they are very proud of it, ”explains Michel Béal, director of the ONF Ile-de-France Ouest.
In the coming days, ten other large oaks will be harvested in the region.
Eight in the forest of Marly (Yvelines) and two others in Dourdan (Essonne).
The first cuts have already started last Friday in the Sarthe, in the forest of Bercé, where the first eight oaks were felled.
In total, more than a thousand hundred-year-old, even bicentennial, trees will be donated across France for the reconstruction of Notre-Dame de Paris.