The comeback of Notre Dame: American builders help to restore iconic Paris landmark
Five years after the Notre Dame Cathedral burned down in Paris, France, the restoration work is almost complete. An American carpenter has been helping out.
PARIS — Five years ago a fire brought Paris’ Notre Dame Cathedral to its knees, destroying the vaulted wooden ceiling and spire.
In Hatfield, Massachusetts, carpenter Hank Silver watched in horror as flames shot into the air and rapidly spread over the fabled Gothic building’s roof, known as “The Forest” because of its long planks of 800-year-old wood.
Soon, Silver joined an army of skilled craftsmen from around the world and went to the building’s aid. Now Paris’ soaring medieval landmark is ready to serve as a symbol of the French capital.
A huge fire swept through the roof of the famed Notre Dame Cathedral in central Paris on April 15, 2019.Geoffroy Van Der Hassely / AFP - Getty Images fileThe work “changed my life,” Silver told NBC News on Sunday, and he said it had given him a new appreciation of the skills carpenters had in the Middle Ages. “It’s a once in a millennium experience,” he said in an interview. “Having that as my job site at my place of work every day does not get old.”Silver, who is part of Carpenters Without Borders, a team of volunteers who restore historical structures the world over, is one of a handful of craftsmen from around the world who are trained to carry out the work of rebuilding Notre Dame.
Much of what they’ve done requires tools re-created on site to match those used by workers centuries ago before the towering symbol of French national pride was completed in 1345.
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