Eight bells return to belfry of Notre Dame in Paris

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00:00Now the Notre Dame Cathedral here in Paris is getting its bells back in time

00:04for the medieval landmark to reopen in December, five years after the

00:09devastating fire. Emerald Maxwell is with me now to tell us a bit about what's

00:14been happening today. So eight bells, hello Emerald, being returned. Tell us a

00:19bit about what's going on. Yes, so soon they will be able to toll again.

00:22Quasimodo will be able to swing on them once again. Eight of the bells of Notre

00:28Dame are returning home to one of the cathedral's emblematic

00:32bell towers. One of them, named Gabriel, because they have names, they're named

00:37after significant figures in the church's history. Well Gabriel weighs

00:41over four tons, while the smallest, Jean-Marie, weighs in at a mere 782 kilos.

00:47So all eight of these were removed from the north tower of the cathedral back in

00:53July so that the construction teams could do their work because they were

00:56busy rebuilding the wooden structure of the tower which had been damaged by the

01:01flames. But they also took the opportunity to clean up the bells,

01:04particularly from the lead dust from the church's burning roof, and also to

01:09restore them at a foundry in Normandy in northern France, which is where they were

01:13originally built in 2013. So we returned to the same team who had built them to

01:19be identical to the old ones they were replacing at the time. Let's take a

01:23listen now to one of the bell makers who was in that team and who is also on

01:27site today. There are two bells that have been restored. Gabriel over here, the

01:33biggest of the eight, whose handle was cracked. So it's been restored and that's

01:37why it looks shinier than the others. The upper part was gilded and then

01:41repolished. And then there's Marcel, the sixth bell, which has also been reheated

01:46and then gently cooled. It's been annealed because it was the one that

01:50heated up the most during the fire. And so Emerald, you said look the bells are

01:55going to toll again soon. Do we know when and what's next for the Notre-Dame?

01:59We do have a date, but first they were brought back to Paris this morning.

02:03They were, as you might be able to see in some of the pictures, they were blessed by

02:06the cathedral's rector and they will eventually be hoisted back to their

02:11positions over the next couple of weeks, where they will also test them so that

02:15they can eventually bring them for the cathedral's reopening. Notre-Dame

02:18actually has 20 bells in total, which are run to mark major events, such as the

02:24end of major conflicts, the end of World War One and World War Two, papal visits

02:28and once upon a time coronations. Also they're run in somber times, in periods

02:33of mourning, such as for the funerals of French heads of state or after those

02:38Paris 2015 terror attacks. These bells though will toll again properly.

02:43On the 7th of December though, that's when the cathedral, which was first

02:47completed in 1345, that's when it will eventually reopen to the public after

02:52that mammoth, more than five-year restoration effort, which has involved

02:57250 construction companies and hundreds of craftsmen and craftswomen. The bells

03:03will also be joined by a new addition to the family though, that's the Olympic

03:07bell that the athletes ran at the Paris Games this summer. That will be given a

03:11second life, a new home in one of the cathedral's bell towers.

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