Notre Dame cathedral is burning down.

Some not horrible news- it appears that the ground level damage is less than what we probably were expecting- 

If I'm not mistaken, a lot of what you see is wood.  And still there.

Those pictures were hard to look at.  Very glad things are not worse than they are.

In reply to alfadriver :

It's a church. They don't need to. Do research.

So I'm going to double down. Why is the Paris emergency plan ... and equipment, so inferior? Why didn't they plan for this? Why no "tower-snorkel" fire retardant plans? Why no Seinne River fire-boat plans? It seems to me that they're ignorant of basic emergency plans. But why would that surprise me? Why did they fold so quickly in 1940?

Gary said:

In reply to alfadriver :

It's a church. They don't need to. Do research.

Need to do what?  Install sprinklers?  You're right they don't and that isn't what Alfa was saying.  He was wondering if SOME churches would look into adding them of their own accord to help protect the structure, the artifacts and the people inside.  I know some more modern churches I've been drug into recently do have sprinkler systems, so it isn't unheard of.

I've no love for religions in general and certainly some are statistically worse than others.  I still hate to see historical objects destroyed, no matter how you feel about the group involved with its creation and ongoing ownership.

Correct. But no. 

Gary said:

So I'm going to double down. Why is the Paris emergency plan ... and equipment, so inferior? Why didn't they plan for this? Why no "tower-snorkel" fire retardant plans? Why no Seinne River fire-boat plans? It seems to me that they're ignorant of basic emergency plans. But why would that surprise me? Why did they fold so quickly in 1940?

C’mon Gary ... ignorant? Really?

I don't want to get banned, we are not perfect over here either. Its an old city, as simple as that. 

Sorry, I'm not ignorant as you would suggest. Please do your research. I would not want anyone to be banned.  

Gary said:

Sorry, I'm not ignorant as you would suggest. Please do your research. I would not want anyone to be banned.  

You said ignorant ... you said they are ignorant of basic emergency plans ... I never did or would call you ignorant. I dont know you.

What research should I do and what research have you done? 

If you are going to say that you have been there, I have too, multiple times. I attended mass there a few times as well. 

So I recently said:

This whole episode is so sad. Annie and I visited this beautiful cathedral twice in the past ten years. We love Paris. We love Notre Dame. That's why we're in mourning tonight. We don't know why, or even how this happened. So many questions. Personally, I don't think the city of Paris, or France in general, had the proper equipment in place, nor did they have a proper emergency plan in place, to pre-empt this type of tragedy.  (Compare the fire equipment for high rise fires in the USA to the third-world crap they have in Paris). They really do have a lot to answer to. We probably won't ever know. I'm not even going beyond a simple natural accident answer to this. That's a "whole nuther" discussion, which probably wouldn't be condoned here.

So believe me, I love Paris. But I realize there's  something wrong going on in France.

In reply to Slippery :

WYH are you saying? Trying to pick a fight over an un-fightable situation? We are on a slippery slope here. I am officially done here.

I’m kinda confused. 

In reply to OHSCrifle :

Me too

In reply to Gary :

But you’re the one who’s being enigmatic and vaguely accusatory and conspiracy-ish. It’s really not clear at all what you’re saying. 

What we should be saying right now is “Wow, it’s really a shame to lose such a beautiful historical monument like that.”  We can wait and see what further information comes to light later before we throw weird, maybe political blame around. 

In reply to Gary:

Not being prepared for something is not the same thing as being ignorant of the risk, which your comment seemed to infer. My apologies if I misunderstand your meaning, but your comments seem to be a bit inflammatory, and in a time of crisis and grief for many, this is neither the time, nor is this the place, to be laying blame at anyone's feet. 

In reply to EastCoastMojo :

Well said, thank you.

In reply to EastCoastMojo :

You absolutely misunderstood my meaning. My comments are not meant to be inflammatory. Geez, how could thay even be meant to be inflammatory? Re-read what I said! Do you have something against what I have previously said about France? And even what Duke said, what did I say wrong? I love Paris. I love France. What is wrong with that?

In reply to Gary :

We have. Several times. I guarantee that you are the only person on this board that knows what you’re talking about. 

Gary said:

Why is the Paris emergency plan ... and equipment, so inferior? Why didn't they plan for this? Why no "tower-snorkel" fire retardant plans? Why no Seinne River fire-boat plans? It seems to me that they're ignorant of basic emergency plans. But why would that surprise me? Why did they fold so quickly in 1940?

This comment specifically implies that they were ignorant of fire safety. There may be many very good reasons that fire safety equipment had not been retrofitted to an almost 800 year old building, not the least of which is the shear cost of it. We cannot assume that they just didn't think about it or that they chose not to because it wasn't required by law. 

If you would like to discuss this further then PM me.

In reply to Gary :

Dude, i don't know you. But from what I've read in your last few posts, you blame the city of Paris, the state of current French society and French Emergency Management people for this tragedy.  And, called them cheese-eating surrender monkeys to boot. I'd say your posts are pretty inflammatory, regardless of intent.  All we can reasonably say at this time is that this is a tragedy, and be thankful they were able to mitigate the damage to the extent they did.

Why don't they have the same fire-protection systems we have in every city in the USA? C'mon face reality. They clearly didn't have plans in place to face this type of crisis ... which should have been in place. Simply common sense.

As I said, neither the time nor the place. 

In reply to EastCoastMojo :

Neither the time nor the place ... what the hell does that mean?

We had a major, major, icon of our civization destroyed, and we can't tell what happened? 

There are cities in this country that don't have a Fire department, much less a state-of-the art fire supression system.  Most houses in rural areas don't have much more than an outdoor spigot and a leaky garden hose.  Old cities are old, and some old buildings can't be retrofit for modern equipment without the literal destruction of the structure.  How anyone can make such general assumptions is a bit disturbing, but that appears to be the case these days.  

It means that this is not the time to be accusing the people of Paris for not doing more to prevent this, and that this forum is not the place to be placing blame. Not now, and not here. Period.

If you love Paris as you said, then now is the time to show them compassion, and give them the benefit of doubt when it comes to the limitations they may face in the management of their infrastructure.