Fire Marshal in Defense of Trump: A burning cathedral is in far more danger of collapsing than one that is covered with flying water tankers' air drops

Among the people who reacted on the day that the Notre Dame cathedral caught fire was the president of the United States, who sent out a tweet:

So horrible to watch the massive fire at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. Perhaps flying water tankers could be used to put it out. Must act quickly!

Not long thereafter, France's civil security agency responded to Donald Trump's tweet by saying that using Canadair planes is not an option: dropping tons of water on the building could cause the entire structure to collapse.

#NotreDame

@PompiersParis

Le largage d'eau par avion sur ce type d'édifice pourrait en effet entraîner l'effondrement de l'intégralité de la structure. Aux côtés des #sapeurspompiers qui font actuellement le maximum pour sauver #NotreDame.

This led in turn to a reaction from a reader who, after a talk with his local Fire Marshal, wrote that "If it's a firefighter [who made that comment], he should be fired immediately."

Terrekain says that he

just talked to [his] local Fire Marshal.

Whoever said that going for an air drop on the Notre Dame cathedral would cause it to collapse, is an IDIOT.

If it's a firefighter, he should be fired immediately.

Aerial water drops typically disperse in the atmosphere; they do not apply that much more weight on the structure than a heavy rainfall and a BURNING cathedral is in much more danger of collapsing than one that is covered and mist-doused in a fire-retardant slurry. Even if it were true that the building would collapse, the only reason to worry about that is if anybody was in the building...but artifacts and architecture are endangered by the FIRE, far more than any collapse unless we're talking about WTC collpases - we're not.

The building's structural integrity is being degraded by the fire, not any amount of water. So you just let the building keep burning?

Whoever claimed that idiocy is either ignorant, or is gas-lighting the public to make Trump look bad...it's idiocy. What were these idiots waiting for? For the entire structure to burn down?

Terrekain goes on to add that 

 

This is like waiting for the WTC to "burn out" when you are given an opportunity to put out the fire (there was no such opportunity then, but hypothetically speaking)...

Trump: "Put it out with water".

Macron: "Oh, if we put water on it, it might collapse...."

Trump: "What are you talking about? If it's going to collapse because of an air-drop, it'll collapse ANYWAY in the time it takes you to call in the air-drop due to the fire. So why not try it and give yourself a chance?"

Macron: "Ummm....RACIST!"

Related: Yes, the Notre Dame Fire Was a Tragedy; But Does It Really Warrant Comparison with 9-11 in America?

In any case, a number of Frenchmen responded to the civil security agency by saying that dropping water from the air does not need to involve sizable planes filled to capacity with huge loads of water — as it happens, Trump did not specifically mention airplanes either, simply aircraft — but can entail helicopters doing the work (with one tweet showing a Los Angeles county chopper in action).

🤔 J'ai bien compris qu'une intervention des canadaires était trop dangereuse pour l'édifice, mais quid d'hélicoptères bombardiers d'eau? #NotreDame pic.twitter.com/D8M5CJxO9v

— Thibault Lbt (@Nomad1108) April 17, 2019