Visitors, seen from the Sully wing, queuing in the Cour Napoleon by the pyramid designed by Chinese-US architect Ieoh Ming Pei, to enter the Louvre Museum in Paris. AFP
The statement followed contact from the Egyptian embassy in Paris, which reached out to the museum to follow up on the incident.
The museum said the reports were inaccurate, confirming that the water leak on 26 November was limited to the Department of Egyptian Antiquities library.
It clarified that this library is located in a separate wing, far from the galleries displaying the Egyptian collection and stressed that no artwork or artefact was damaged.
According to the Louvre, the leak was traced to the water network feeding the heating and ventilation systems in the department’s library.
The incident occurred when an external contractor inadvertently opened a pipe connected to the HVAC system. The pipe had already been shut off for several months because of its deteriorated condition.
The museum added that its teams had previously identified the weakness in the system and that the entire water network was scheduled to be replaced starting in September 2026 as part of the broader “Louvre – The New Renaissance” renovation project announced by President Emmanuel Macron on 28 January 2025.
The project aims to restore, modernize, and upgrade the museum’s historic complex.
Of the 15,000 volumes held in the library, only 350 were affected, the statement said. These were mostly modern studies and specialized Egyptology journals used by the department’s researchers and visiting scholars.
No rare books, heritage works, archives, or ancient manuscripts were among the damaged items.
Louvre teams responded immediately by drying the wet books and magazines and installing dehumidifiers.
The museum said there were no irreparable losses. Any affected volumes will either be restored or replaced and will be fully available to readers again in the coming weeks.
Short link: