The freight forwarding and logistics specialist, CMA CGM LOG, has just shipped Jacques Cousteau’s legendary research ship, Calypso, from Concarneau in France to Turkey, where she will be renovated.
One of the tricks of the trade, according to the company, was to select and charter a suitable vessel. The Calypso is 40 metres long and weighs in at 110 tonnes, and had to be loaded onto a vessel large enough to have two cranes with the power to lift her, yet small enough to berth in the port of Concarneau.
The oceanographic vessel was star of the “Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau”. For 45 years, from 1951 to 1996, she sailed the world’s oceans, undertaking scientific explorations.
The vessel also became a movie studio for the film “The Silent World” shot in 1954. It won a Palme d’Or at the 1955 Cannes Film Festival.
Tragically on January 8, 1996, the Calypso was involved in a mooring accident and sank.
But now raised and once renovated, the Calypso will remain at the service of science and education, as Jacques Cousteau wished.
