Eight bells, one weighing over 4 tonnes, had been returned to Notre Dame cathedral in Paris on Thursday, simply months earlier than it’s due to reopen 5 years after a devastating hearth.

“These bells are the voice of the cathedral, those that ring day by day,” mentioned Philippe Jost, head of the Rebuilding Notre-Dame de Paris organisation.

The bells’ arrival “lets us look forward to the rebirth of Notre Dame” on Dec 7, he added, talking amongst dozens of onlookers who had come to snap photos of the supply.

Teams repairing harm from the April 15, 2019 blaze had to take away the bells – from the most important, “Gabriel”, to the smallest, “Jean-Marie” – from Notre Dame’s north tower final July to full their work.

The bells themselves have been cleaned of lead mud thrown off by the church’s burning roof and restored on the foundry that first forged them in Normandy in northern France earlier than their supply by truck again to Paris.

Notre Dame rector Olivier Ribadeau Dumas additionally blessed the peal of eight bells, every named after a major determine from the cathedral’s historical past, on Thursday.

The bells might be restored to their place in the belfry in “the following two or three weeks” and examined earlier than the reopening, Jost mentioned.

Heavyweight “Gabriel” weighs greater than 4.1 tonnes, whereas the lightest, “Jean-Marie”, clocks in at a dainty 782kg (1,724 kilos).

Notre Dame has 20 bells in complete, together with two large “bourdons” – the most important weighing 13 tonnes – producing the bottom notes that hold in the south tower, that are rung for main Church occasions akin to Easter, Christmas or the loss of life or election of a Pope.

First accomplished in 1345 after virtually two centuries of building, the cathedral is ready to reopen on Dec 7 after a large restoration effort that’s nonetheless below manner.

Around 10 million individuals per 12 months visited the church earlier than the hearth. – AFP