It ’s been over a year since a fervency destroyedNotre - Dame ’s iconic steeple in April 2019 , and we still have n’t determined the glare ’s full effect on the environment . AsSmithsonianreports , grounds of defilement from the incident has been found in an unusual piazza : Paris ’s beehives .
A new study published in the journalEnvironmental Science & Technology Lettersexplains that hives located downwind from the Notre - Dame fire contained honey with mellow tightness of lead . As the duomo ’s ceiling andspireburned , 450 tons of jumper cable melted in the extreme heat , free wild particles into the air . While lead had understandably settled into the structure itself — pee it unsafe toreopento the public even after it was renovate — the question remains of how far the toxic materials diffuse beyond the internet site .
The study shows that at least some lead managed to travel a few miles forth from the church . Honey taste three months after the hell from hives downwind from the Notre - Dame fire contained four times as much jumper lead as honey from the Parisian suburbs , and 3.5 times as much as Parisian honey collected before April 2019 .
This does n’t mean that honey from certain Paris neighborhood is insecure to eat . The sampling with the highest numbers , choose from a hive 3 international nautical mile west of the cathedral , contained 0.08 microgram of lead per 1 g of dearest . The European Union permit honey to be sell with lead concentrations up to 0.10 micrograms per gram .
“ The highest grade of lead that we detected were the equivalent of 80 drops of water in an Olympic sized swimming pool , ” study co - generator Dominique Weis , manager of the University of British Columbia ’s Pacific Centre for Isotopic and Geochemical Research , said in astatement . But what the finding think for place and businesses in Notre - Dame ’s surrounding area - where environmental leading samples have exceed the safety guidelines20 timesover in some spot — is still unclear .
[ h / tSmithsonian ]
