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14 / THE MYSTERIOUS OCEAN

MONACO
Macaronesia

SEPTEMBER 2017

MADEIRA
Caribbean
NOV./DEC. 2017 CABO VERDE

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
MARTINIQUE

MONACO EXPLORATIONS
A promising first year

In 2017, H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco announced the launch of the Monaco

Explorations (EDM). Monaco Ocean Week 2018 was a chance to set out the

initial framework of this programme through to 2020.

On 4 April 2017, H.S.H. Prince Albert II of Monaco
unveiled plans for a new worldwide ocean explo-
ration campaign to follow in the footsteps of his
great-great-grandfather Albert I, the father of mo-
dern oceanography, whose work in the late 19
th
century was continued by Commander Cousteau.
This new research programme allows scientists
across the world to set sail on versatile vessels to
carry out observation work and collect samples
from isolated sites - sites which are very difficult
to access but contain highly significant and fragile
biodiversity. Staggered over three years, the Mo-
naco Explorations have, between late August and
late October 2017, completed 74 mission days
hosting or supporting nearly fifty scientists.

The islands of Madeira, Cabo Verde (which Albert I
of Monaco visited over one hundred years ago)
and Martinique were the first destinations.

From 4 to 24 October 2017 the Sargassum Transatlantic mission aimed to study
the ecological role and functions of the “rafts” of Sargassum, these brown algae
which proliferate since 2011 in the tropical Atlantic, causing mass strandings.
© Explorations de Monaco/Olivier Borde.