Louvre Heist: Attendant Recalls the Shocking Moment of the Robbery

Mon Nov 10 2025 23:17:41 GMT+0200 (Eastern European Standard Time)

An attendant at the Louvre recounts the terrifying experience of the recent heist where thieves stole eight priceless pieces of jewelry, including items once owned by Napoleon's wives.

During a shocking robbery at the Louvre, an attendant described the chaos as thieves burst into the gallery using an angle grinder, quickly stealing €88 million worth of jewelry. The incident has raised serious concerns about the museum's security measures, which had long been criticized for being insufficient.

A gallery attendant on duty at the Louvre when thieves broke in and stole eight of France's crown jewels has said no-one could have been prepared for what unfolded as visitors began to arrive on Sunday morning.

All of a sudden we heard a huge noise, she told radio station France Inter, in the first account given by an attendant at the scene.

The unnamed attendant and two colleagues initially thought the noise to be an angry visitor, but it was not a normal sound: It was a dull, slightly metallic noise. It was, in fact, the moment thieves had used an angle grinder to burst through a reinforced window into the Gallery of Apollo, where the Louvre's collection of historic jewelry is kept.

Within eight minutes, the gang seized treasures, including a necklace that belonged to Napoleon's wife Empress Marie-Louise and a diadem of Napoleon III's wife Empress Eugenie, worth an estimated total of €88m (£77m).

The thieves used a mechanical ladder on the back of a lorry to lift them to a first-floor balcony to gain entry to the gallery. Two tourists ran towards them in panic, she said. I saw one of the criminals turn around with something that looked to me like a chainsaw, then I yelled at my colleagues to get out, she recalled. She shouted a second time that it was a robbery and that they should run.

One of her colleagues raised the alarm over a walkie-talkie and then we finished evacuating the visitors without quite realizing really what was going on. They shut all the doors as they left to protect the neighboring galleries.

On reflection, the attendant said for us it was unbelievable the display cases could have been broken... never for a moment did we think there was such a risk... nobody can be prepared for that.

Another Louvre employee described the aftermath of the heist, highlighting the strong smell of petrol where the gang had parked their lorry. The stolen crown, meant to be a highlight of the theft, ended up being lost during the getaway.

The Louvre's difficulties with security funding have come under scrutiny, as museum director Laurence des Cars revealed years of underfunding left them with minimal surveillance capabilities. Despite assurances that security protocols were effective on the day, the incident has prompted calls for significant improvements to the museum’s security framework.