The maiden voyages of two ships, fitted with the Turbo sail system, are paving the way to enormous savings and efficiency in international and domestic shipping. The prototype, Moulin a Vent, set sail from Morocco on Octover 12 1983 but due to adverse weather conditions did not succeed on its journey. However, on June 17th 1985 Alcyone, accompanied by Captain Cousteau, the Calyso and a flotilla of other ships triumphantly arrives in New York after an almost flawless journey from La Rochelle.
When Christopher Columbus discovered Haiti in 1492 he described a different Haiti, an island that has suffered centuries of exploitation and people who now live in the misery of over-population.
The Cousteau team discover in the waters around Cuba a richness that divers have not seen in any other part of the Caribbean Sea for at least twenty years. The team film the strange vertical position of the shark whale whilst feeding. Captain Cousteasu also discovers in President Fidel Castro a common love of the sea.
Alcyone's debut and its first major test as a research and diving platform sharing duties with the Calypso. Alcyone and her team challenge the seas of Cape Horn, widely thought to be the most dangerous ocean passage in the world. The team film huge glactiers, giant crabs, huge albatrosses and tiny penguins. Alcyone herself nearly joins the victims of The Horn when she strikes a hidden rock.
Captain Cousteau and the crew of the Alcyone head northward from Cape Horn to investigate Mexico's fabled Sea of Cortez. The youngest and deepest of all the world's ocean gulfs; the seas is risch with marine creatures - birds and sea lions, fish and mammals. The Cousteau team compile the first complete record of the feeding behaviour of the elusive finback whale, the mating of the mama rays and spawning rites of the grunion.
The Cousteau team pn board the Calyspo set sail for the South Pasific and the Marquseas Islands. Once hearty and independant, the people suffered death and destruction under the Spaniards and the Missionaries. Today these fiercely proud people remain linked to the ancient rituals and customs of the past. The Cousteau cameras capture the beauty of the Marquesas from the highest waterfall in the Southern Hemisphere to mountain streams teeming with blue tropical fish.
The Channel Islands lie a few hours from the coast of California. Isalnds that have remained almost unchanged from prehistoric times due to the rocky coastlines and the violent sea. Divers from the Alcyone discover grey whales, carnivorous sea-otters, angel sharks, langouste and lamp-fish. A rich and fertile sea life now threatened by commercial and sporting fishermen.
Over the centuries the riches of the Channel Islands have drawn fishermen and seal hunters. However, man the exploror and hunter is becoming more of man the protector. The natural environment and the rare animals, thought to be almost extinct, are beginning to reappear - seals, garibaldis, foxes. However scientists have been unable to find a single fish uncontaminated by the toxic wastes from Los Angeles. Jean-Michel Cousteau appears before a congressional hearing to air his observations and recommendations on the Channel Islands. A new oceanic policy is now under consideration.
Captain Cousteau and his team rediscover New Zealand. The Calypso travels around its coastline whilst a land team crosses more than 42,000 kilometres of countyside. New Zealand extends from the sub-tropical zone to the sub Antartic and therefore has an immensely varied fauna and flora. The team discover amongst the wonders of New Zealand, the Argonaut, the kiwi, black coral and the giant moa.
Captain Cousteau recognises and discusses the problem of fishing around the coast of New Zealand. The Calypso divers meet the endangered Elephant fish and film families of sea-lions. The Cousteau team also takes an interest in the plight of the first inhabitants of New Zealnd - the Maori.
New Zealand, an island of three climates, sub-Antartic, temerate and sub-tropical. An island of fire, ice and earthquake. Captain Cousteau, and team, journey to New Zealnd's furthermost points: WhiteIsland with its still alive volcaneo: North Cape where the Cousteau diver discover an harmonious ecosystem: Fjoriand where by helicopter the team followed the beautiful deer.
Tahiti, once a South Pacific paradise, has gradually fallen prey to tourism, technology and most frightening of all, the nuclear weapn. Whilst exploring the famed underwater MacDonald Seamount, the Cousteau divers are startled by a pre-eruption quake which is a live demostration of the forces that created the Tahitian islands. The Cousteau team dive with local fishermen hunting for the precious black pearls. Captain Cousteau investiagtes the rationale behind the underground nuclear tests taking place around the island of Mururoa.
On land, most predators capable of devouring people have been elimiinated, tamed or banished beyond easy contact, but the largest of all predatory fish still roams the sea beyond our control.
Even the earliest observers recognised a kinship with these air breathing mammals, but were unable to penetrate their hidden lives.
Cousteau focuses on Plawan, itself an archipelago of a thousand islands among more than 7,000 small and large land masses that make uo what is one of today's most turmultuous yet seductive nations on earth.
Join Jean-Michel Cousteau as he ivestigates the dilemma of Nauru, an island that embraces the critical question of our times - what could, or would, we do if we actually ran out of natural resources?
The team sets out on a frantastic adventure, to storm a fossil coral reef. This impregnable fortress, whose ramparts bristle with sharpened spurs, guards some of the last primary forests in Madagascar.
Cousteau divers drop in on a whale shark more than ten metres long.
High in the province of Qinghai, where China's Yellow River rises, Captain Jacques cousteau's team begins its grand film fresco of the Kingdom of the Middle.
Within the borders of Siberia and outer Mongolia, 4,200 kilometres from Moscow, Calypso divers plunge into the crystal sea; Lake Baikal, the pearl of Siberia.
Charting the same course as the Portugese navigators who explored southern Africa in the late 15th centuary, Alcyone cruises the coastal waters of the African peninsula.
Our team tracks dismonds hidden in the sands all the way to the ghost towns of Sperrgebeit - "the forbidden zone".