Item of the month

The Collections Department is exhibiting the medical kit belonging to Matthieu Langlois, a former RAID doctor who was called into action during the attack on the Bataclan on 13 November 2015.

© Don de Matthieu Langlois / Donated by Matthieu Langlois / Collections du GIP-MMT

Matthieu Langlois first encountered terrorism in 1995 when he was sent to the scene of the attack at Saint-Michel RER station in Paris. This experience reinforced his decision to specialise in emergency medicine. In 2007, he joined RAID, a specialist intervention unit of the French National Police, where he served as an operational doctor.
In 2012, during the attacks carried out by Mohamed Merah in Toulouse and Montauban, Matthieu Langlois experienced what he calls his true ‘baptism of fire’. As the second doctor deployed on the operation, he positioned himself at the rear of the column, ready to treat the injured as soon as the terrorist was apprehended. Three years later, he was deployed to the Bataclan, where he entered the venue with the intervention unit. The scene was one of extreme violence. The number of casualties was incomparable to previous operations, and the survivors’ state of shock complicated the response. This unique experience illustrates the complexity of such operations, where the role of a first responder is to simultaneously manage the medical emergency, the potentially still-active threat, and the psychological distress of the survivors.
This kit — one of the two carried by Matthieu Langlois on the night of 13 November — was handed over to the museum’s preparatory mission in February 2026. A discreet yet essential object, it embodies the doctor’s commitment to working at the very heart of the danger. Prior to the donation, it was restocked with the essential supplies it usually contains: compression materials, haemorrhage-control devices, and equipment vital for initial life-saving measures.
Donated alongside several other items used by the former RAID doctor, this kit thus enriches the collections of the Museum-Memorial. It bears witness to the role and commitment of the first responders mobilised during terrorist attacks.