Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/09/03/national-museum-of-brazil-dest.html
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That’s a shame.
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Indeed. There is probably loads of ethnographic stuff gone up there.
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It was an excellent museum situated in the middle of a fine park frequented by families every weekend. At the back of the museum is the zoo of Rio.
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I can only hope they had a strong digitization program, but it seems the couldn’t even afford adequate fire prevention. The Guardian writes: “It wasn’t immediately clear how the fire began. The museum was part of Rio’s Federal University but had fallen into disrepair in recent years.” Wikipedia says they also had a meteorite on display that was discovered in 1784. I wonder if it survived the fire.
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A terrible loss. Could scarcely imagine losing any Smithsonian to fire.
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This is a huge tragedy. Apparently, almost everything stored and exhibited at the main museum was lost. 
From Wikipedia:
The National Museum held a vast collection with more than 20 million objects, encompassing some of the most important material records regarding natural science and anthropology in Brazil, as well a large number of items originated from distinct regions of the planet and produced by several cultures and ancient civilizations. Formed along more than two centuries through expeditions, excavations, acquisitions, donations and exchanges, the collection is subdivided into seven main nuclei: geology, paleontology, botany, zoology, biological anthropology, archaeology and ethnology. The collection is the principal basis for the research conducted by the academic departments of the museum — which are responsible for carrying out activities in all the regions of the Brazilian territory and several places of the world, including the Antarctic continent. The museum also has one of the largest scientific libraries of Brazil, with over 470,000 volumes and 2,400 rare works
According to some Brazilian posters on other sites, the museum has been underfunded for decades, but things got really bad since 2014.
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They have put out a call for people’s photos of the things that were there. Most of them were physical objects that cannot be replaced. Only about 1% of the artifacts and papers stored at the museum were even on display. Lack of adequate fire protection doesn’t quite cover the problems, however. The firefighters couldn’t get water out of the hydrants near the museum because of lack of pressure, and they had to pump water from the lake in the park to put out the fire.
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What a terrible loss for Brazil and for the world. The scholars who worked with the collections and archives must be inconsolable.
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Fire protection certainly wasn’t the only issue. But also from the Guardian, “Duart also said that the museum had just closed a deal with the Brazilian government’s development bank, BNDES, for funds that included a fire prevention project. ‘This is the most terrible irony,’ he said.”
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But, due to Brazilian legislation, these funds would be released only after the general elections scheduled for next October.
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People said It survived. I believe It was because the meteorite was massive and displayed in the museum entrance hall, in front of the front door, thus the infernal heat wasn’t bad as in the interior Halls of the institution.
Edited to include a link with images of the meteorite after the fire:
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the destruction of the alexandria library was a warn out story from a battle
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The gradual destruction of the Library of Alexandria and its successor institutions was the result of anti-intellectualism, war, and religious fanaticism. This catastrophe shows that austerity and greed and political corruption can be just as destructive to a site of cultural and scientific heritage.
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Moral of the story. If you have stuff that is ‘important’… don’t put it all in one building.
Or at least be sure that this building get all the due funds to its maintenance.
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Some firesafe vaults and bunkers could help too.
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I hope they have it too in Biblioteca Nacional, Real Gabinte Português de Leitura and Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, for example. If they do not take the necessary precautions, we will live crying the loss of our history, because these accidents are always happening continuously.
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What a tragedy for all humanity.
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All of humanity’s creations are but ephemera in the long pointless march of time.
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