For the third time in a month, a crack has appeared on the street facing the world's oldest church, reports Nevine El-Aref Last week the serenity befitting Old Cairo's religious heritage was shattered by a loud crack -- a three-metre-wide chunk of the street had caved in near the Hanging Church, separating the pavement from the church façade. According to Father Morqos Aziz, the church's pastor, this was the third defect to appear in the street in the space of a month. "It really is a catastrophe," Father Aziz told Al- Ahram Weekly. He said this latest incident represented a major threat to one of Egypt's major Coptic shrines, which is currently being restored along with the neighbouring Coptic Museum. According to Father Aziz, the collapse occurred as a result of work being done on a project that aims to reduce the level of subterranean water in the area. He said the disturbances only began once the micro tunnel machinery being used for the project had made its way through the ground layers, smacked down against a solid surface, and stopped. A committee of 20 experts made up of architects, archaeologists, engineers, subsoil engineers and top Cairo governorate officials subsequently converged on the area to inspect every inch of the church and its surroundings. Mohamed Mahgoub, director-general of Old Cairo and Fustat monuments at the Supreme Council of Antiquities (SCA), told the Weekly that several measures had been taken to guarantee the stability of the church's foundations and façade. All urban development construction had been put on hold, while a number of sensitive electronic sensors had been installed in several places inside the church to monitor -- minute by minute -- the movement of the walls. Two inspection shafts, each one metre wide, have been dug in front of the church's main gate and beside the entrance of the 18th-century Al- Barati house next door, in order to assess the actual reason behind the crack's appearance. Mahgoub denied that the use of the micro tunnel machinery had caused the ground shift, and instead attributed the cause to the slack nature of the soil underneath the paved road. According to Abdallah Kamel, head of the SCA's Islamic and Coptic department, no harm has been done to the church. Kamel pointed out that the Hanging Church has a strong base, upon which it has survived the test of time. The church was originally built in the fourth century on top of the two southwestern bastions of the Roman fortress of Babylon. "So it was originally well constructed," Kamel said. He added that in 1997, when the restoration project began, the supporting columns of the church were reinforced, the walls and masonry were consolidated, cracks were repaired, and an efficient sewage system was installed to protect the foundations of the fortress and the church against rising underground water. Woodwork, frescoes and icons in the church had been also restored. Old Cairo is one of the most historically important areas in Cairo. It houses not only the Coptic Museum but also several other important monuments that represent the three monotheistic faiths: Judaism, in the Synagogue of Ben Ezra; Christianity, in the Hanging and St Sergius churches, among others; and Islam, in the Mosque of Amr Ibn Al-Aas.
