Scaffolding firm says workers smoked at Paris' Notre-Dame
http://news.trust.org/item/20190424184708-qxte624 April 2019
...A spokesman for family-owned Le Bras Freres, confirming a report in French weekly Le Canard Enchaine, told Reuters that some workers of its Europe Echafaudage scaffolding unit had informed police that they had "sometimes" smoked on the scaffolding, despite a smoking ban on the site.
"We condemn it. But the fire started inside the building... so for company Le Bras this is not a hypothesis, it was not a cigarette butt that set Notre-Dame de Paris on fire," Le Bras Frères spokesman Marc Eskenazi said....
...Europe Echaffaudage also ruled out the possibility that the fire might have been started by an electricity incident at one of the two lifts on the site.
"The lifts' electricity was perfectly within specifications and well maintained," he said.
He added that the two lifts were on the outside of the building, situated at 45 and 65 metres (71 yards) from the base of the spire, where the first smoke and flames had been spotted and that the workers had cut the power to the lifts at 1750 when they had left the site for the day....
...The Canard Enchaine also reported that electrical wiring ran through the roof of the cathedral, but the church administration denied that safety norms had not been respected.
"Nothing was ever done without the authorisation of the state...There were no wires dangling, everything was properly installed," Notre-Dame spokesman Andre Finot said.
In 2012, electrical engines had been installed to sound the bells in the spire.
Finot said that when a first smoke alarm rang, security staff had made verifications but had not remarked anything unusual....
