The witnesses, heard by the Danish newspaper Berlingskesay that in the early hours of the morning, shortly after the fire at the Copenhagen Stock Exchange had already devoured the 17th century spire, Brian Mikkelsenformer Minister of Justice now head of the Danish Chamber of Commerce, ran away dragging a 19th century canvas on his head.
Like him, dozens of employees and passers-by joined the operation to recover the assets kept inside the building engulfed in flames, while the firefighters are still trying to contain the fire which spread to around half of the structure with a high column of smoke also visible from Malmö, in Sweden.
The Danish police have ruled out that there are anyone involved and explained that the ten workers who were on duty on the roof are all safe. In the meantime, however, the flames have yet to be put out and the part that burned now risks collapsing.
The hypotheses on the dynamics
The building was currently undergoing restoration and for this reason it was surrounded by scaffolding but the renovation, according to initial reconstructions, may have aggravated the spread of the flames. Although some employees present inside the Chamber of Commerce heard the fire alarm sounding and declared that it was not the first time it had happened, the suspicion is that other devices had been disconnected to avoid false alarms during the works. The fire doors may also have been removed to facilitate the works.
“400 years of history up in smoke”
“A piece of history on fire,” commented the prime minister Puts Frederiksento the news agency Ritzau while the re Frederik X he entrusted his words to social media. “This morning we woke up to a sad sight.” “Over the generations, the characteristic dragon spire has contributed to defining Copenhagen as the ‘city of towers'” concluded the sovereign who today would have been busy celebrating the 84th birthday of his mother, Queen Margrethe who last January abdicated in his favor.
“Terrible images from the stock exchange this morning. 400 years of Danish cultural heritage in flames”, said the Minister of Culture of Denmark, Jakob Engel-Schmidthe commented on X.
“The stock exchange is to Copenhagen what Notre-Dame is to Paris,” commented Foreign Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen. And one of the first witnesses heard at the scene made the same parallel. “This is our Notre-Dame,” one witness told Danish television, Henrik Gragecomparing the fire to the one that engulfed the roof and spire of the cathedral in central Paris in 2019. “It’s a tragic day,” he added, as reported Bbc.
The “Borsen”
The “Borsen”, one of the oldest buildings in the city, was built under the reign of Christian IV between 1619 and 1640, and is located near the Danish parliament, Christiansborg Palace, on the island of Slotsholmen. Among the main tourist destinations of the city, it contributed with its “Dragon Tower” to building the skyline of Copenhagen.
The collapsed spire, over 50 meters high, depicted four dragons whose tails twist and were symbolically said to protect from enemies and fire. Until today, the Stock Exchange had survived fires that occurred nearby several times: Christiansborg burned down several times, as did the nearby Privatbanken building and the Proviantgården.
Until 1974 the building housed the Copenhagen Stock Exchange, while today it is owned by the Danish Chamber of Commerce Dansk Erhverv.
Among the works kept inside, in addition to the four charcoal drawings by Lorenz Frølich depicting four virtues – work, justice, courage and love – the large group portrait of the Danish impressionist Peder Severine Krøyer of the Copenhagen Stock Exchange.