ISTANBUL

A major leak flooded the Egyptian antiquities department of Paris' Louvre Museum on Nov. 27, damaging around 400 books and reigniting concerns about the ageing infrastructure of the world's most-visited museum in France, just weeks after an audacious daytime jewel theft.

According to La Tribune de l’Art, which first reported, the flooding was not an unforeseen accident.

For years, the department had repeatedly requested funds from Louvre Deputy Director General Francis Steinbock to relocate the collections or install protective measures, warning that ageing pipes in the suspended ceilings posed a growing risk.

Those requests were rejected, as was a proposal to acquire appropriate furniture to safeguard rare works such as Karl Richard Lepsius’s Description of Egypt.

An external contractor's assistance in moving the books to a safer location, which was made possible by the relocation of another department's library, was also reportedly refused.

While the most precious volumes escaped damage, the report says they remain stored under windows and protected only by bubble wrap, leaving them exposed to storms known to cause severe leaks in that part of the building.

The leak also forced the closure of affected offices in the Mollien Pavilion and followed a smaller incident in the same area a week earlier.

The incident comes after a group of thieves, on Oct. 19, parked a stolen truck outside the Louvre Museum, used a furniture lift to reach the first floor, and forced their way into one of the museum’s most ornate rooms.

Within minutes, they fled on scooters with royal jewels, including an emerald and diamond necklace once given by Napoleon Bonaparte to his second wife, Austria’s Marie-Louise, and a diadem belonging to Empress Eugenie, the wife of Napoleon III.

In a separate development, the museum announced in late November that it would raise ticket prices for most non-EU visitors to €32, a 45% increase.

The Louvre welcomed 8.7 million visitors in 2024, 69% of them from abroad.