Eiffel Tower evacuated by police for several hours

The three floors of the Eiffel Tower were evacuated for nearly two hours on Saturday after police bomb disposal experts arrived on the scene following a bomb threat, according to the monument's operating company and Paris police.

"The police are on site, the bomb squad is on site", a Sete spokeswoman said, stressing that "This is a standard procedure in this type of situation, although it is rare."

The evacuation involved all three floors of the monument, including the tower restaurant, as well as the forecourt, the spokeswoman added.

A large security perimeter was quickly set up, traffic diverted and the monument evacuated at 12:15pm. The alert was lifted at around 3:30pm, and the Iron Lady reopened to the public.

The last bomb scare that led to the tower being evacuated, also for two hours, was in September 2020, when an anonymous call to the police raised the alarm.

Police said at the time that a man had "shouted 'Allahu Akbar' and declared that he was going to 'blow everything up' at the tower".

In 2022, Paris' most emblematic monument welcomed more than 5.8 million visitors.