Farewell to the Jeanne d'Arc
It's always sad to see a fine ship sail its last voyage. The French helicopter-carrier, cruiser and training vessel Jeanne d'Arc having completed her 46 years of duty, and traversed 1,800,000 nautical miles, has been decommissioned. The ship was built in the early 1960's and by all accounts has become obsolete. However the men who served on the Jeanne evoke their fondest memories and some denounce Sarkozy for not replacing her. For those French readers interested, Secret Defense has a lot of comments.
The last key mission of the Jeanne was to deliver text books to the school children of New York City. If you are interested, click here for an excellent gallery of 44 photos of this March 2010 visit to NYC. The men on board, the scenes of the ship, are a reminder to me of how France should look to the outside world - proud and capable, disciplined, reserved, and yet approachable.
The photos above and below are from another slide show at Le Point. Below, on a foggy day the Jeanne d'Arc sits in Le Havre before one last visit to Rouen. She then moves on to Brest, the final destination.
Note: The link above to Secret Defense has been fixed.
posted by tiberge @ 9:18 PM
2 comments
links to this post
2 Comments:
Indeed sad. I wear a pin from this ship with the coat of arms of Sainte Jeanne.
Unthinkable not to have an active ship in her honor, but one wonders if this is intentional.
(The link to Secret Défense appears broken and now takes one to Libération!)
@ Anonymous,
Is it intentional? I don't know, but nothing would surprise me. They decommission this ship, but they are going to provide the new Ministry of Defense with a 30 million euro swimming pool!
Sorry about the link. It has been fixed.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home