These are arguably the longest minutes of their career.
The most striking.
Perhaps the most distressing.
Thursday morning, six municipal police officers from Nice found themselves on the front line facing the assailant of the Notre-Dame basilica who killed three times.
It all happened very quickly.
“There were two concurrent alerts.
A parishioner comes out of the basilica and comes across a pedestrian patrol, explains Richard Gianotti, director of the municipal police.
She says there is a bloody person lying on the ground.
At the same time, another faithful, also unharmed and who fled in time, activates a warning terminal
(Editor's note: directly connected to the municipal police and to the city cameras)
located nearby ”.
It is then 8:54 a.m.
The first two agents enter by the main door and discover the septuagenarian slaughtered.
The attack is very real.
Four other agents, arrived in reinforcement of the municipal police station located nearby, enter the church on the side, by the entrance of the sacristy.
They find themselves in front of the assailant, in a corridor.
“Either he tries to run away or he tries to pursue the injured lady who fled to a snack bar
(Editor's note: the third victim who will die a little later)
.
We don't know, ”explains the manager.
VIDEO. The course of the attack that killed 3 people
Still according to his story, the terrorist, seeing the police, does not hesitate: "He rushes at them with his knife, shouting Allahu akbar!"
A first agent fires with his electric pulse pistol.
The blow passes by.
The terrorist continues to advance, threatening it seems, determined to stab them.
The action takes place in seconds.
Two other officers then draw their service weapon and fire.
“We are within the strict framework of self-defense.
There is no doubt about his intentions, ”says the director.
The murderer is hit this time.
Down.
Seriously injured.
He is still hospitalized this Friday.
However, the intervention of the police is not over.
New reinforcements are arriving.
“National and municipal police officers enter through one side of the main door, to raise doubts.
It is then not known if there is a second assailant or perhaps explosives.
The progression takes place in the basilica.
We always fear, in this case, the over-attack.
There will ultimately be no accomplice inside.
"Proud to have been able to neutralize this man"
Among the speakers on Thursday, one of the municipal police officers is one of those who were already on the ground in August in the spectacular disarmament of a woman brandishing a weapon (which will prove to be fictitious) on the Saetone square, behind the basilica.
The video of this courageous operation had made the rounds of social networks.
Other agents have known "from near or far" the attack of July 14, 2016. A very sharp scar in the city, revived by this new attack.
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In Nice, after the attack on the basilica, tears and anger
Twenty-four hours after the tragic events, the municipal police "feel proud to have been able to neutralize this man and to save lives," testifies their boss.
But they are also affected by a dramatic situation, also traumatic.
There is the technique and then, afterwards, there is the human being who reacts differently and does not experience events in the same way.
"" It is not trivial to take out your service weapon and use it, that does not happen often in a career ", he adds.
The officers resumed work.
Almost normally.
They are at their post this Friday.
“There is of course a psychological unit which is set up, details Richard Gianotti, we will also organize an operational debriefing with the intervention of a psychologist so that they speak, that they tell.
They are followed and surrounded!
"