This year human­ity cel­e­brates cen­ten­nial of the birth of one of the great explor­ers and inven­tors of the twen­ti­eth cen­tury Jacques-Yves Cousteau. Jacques-Yves Cousteau was a French naval offi­cer. He and Émile Gag­nan designed the Aqua-Lung, the first self-contained under­wa­ter breath­ing appa­ra­tus, or scuba. It made longer trips under­wa­ter pos­si­ble and freed divers from heavy hel­mets to float as if in space. He brought the mys­te­ri­ous under­wa­ter world to mil­lions by film­ing his adven­tures on the Calypso, a ship he turned into a lab and field research ves­sel. From this ship Cousteau shot the film “The Silent World”, which won the Palme d’Or in Cannes in 1956.

Har­ness­ing the power of visual imagery, Cousteau cre­ated more than 120 doc­u­men­taries and 50 books, and brought aware­ness of the marine envi­ron­ment to mil­lions of peo­ple around the planet. The world stands in his debt for inspir­ing entire gen­er­a­tions of marine biol­o­gists, film­mak­ers, pho­tog­ra­phers and con­ser­va­tion­ists. Later in his life, Cousteau saw that the ocean’s resources are not infi­nite, and sought to edu­cate the world about the fragility of the envi­ron­ment. The Cousteau legacy con­tin­ues through his chil­dren and grand­chil­dren, who have fol­lowed in his foot­steps to edu­cate and inspire. Jacques Cousteau said, “peo­ple pro­tect what they love.” As a com­mu­nity, we must also con­tinue his legacy, to share our images and videos with the world, show­ing species and places that most peo­ple will never see, but which are vitally impor­tant to conserve.

Today it is hard to over­state Cousteau’s influ­ence. With his iconic red beanie and famed ship Calypso, the French marine explorer, sailed the world for much of the late 20^th cen­tury, edu­cat­ing mil­lions about the Earth’s oceans and its inhabitants—and inspir­ing their pro­tec­tion. His pio­neer­ing under­wa­ter documentaries—including the Oscar-winning films The Golden Fish, and World With­out Sun had a bald sto­ry­line. It was a deep and com­plete intro­duc­tion for the gen­eral pub­lic to the under­sea world. He also helped restrict com­mer­cial whal­ing. The mora­to­rium remains in place today, though some coun­tries still hunt whales in the name of sci­en­tific research.

Cousteau also orga­nized a pop­u­lar cam­paign against a French-government plan to dump nuclear waste into the Mediter­ranean Sea in 1960—and took his fight straight to the pres­i­dent of the repub­lic. He acknowl­edged that it was a clean power source and full of pos­si­bil­i­ties but felt that—as long as we’re deal­ing with waste that we don’t know how to handle—we should not pur­sue it. In the end, the train car­ry­ing the waste turned back after women and chil­dren staged a sit-in on the tracks.

The widow of Jacques Cousteau said Tues­day she is try­ing to relaunch his iconic ship the Calypso — sunk, badly dam­aged and now in rehab — in time to mark the cen­ten­nial of his birth. Aboard the Calypso, Cousteau unlocked the mys­ter­ies of the sea for tens of mil­lions of TV view­ers in the 1960s and 1970s with his riv­et­ing doc­u­men­tary series, “The Under­sea World of Jacques Cousteau.” Francine Cousteau and the Cousteau Soci­ety announced a year of events what would have been the 100^th birth­day of the under­sea pio­neer, who with his red cap for a time became syn­ony­mous with the under­wa­ter uni­verse. The relaunch­ing of the 43-meter (140-feet) ship would be a cen­ter­piece of the cen­ten­nial, which begins this week.

Another high­light of the cen­ten­nial will be under way within days — the film­ing expe­di­tion of three marine reserves in the Mediter­ranean. Con­ducted with the National Geo­graphic Soci­ety, the project will com­pare find­ings with those doc­u­mented by Cousteau in the 1940s. Son Pierre-Yves, cur­rently in Cor­sica, is lead­ing that project. “In this year, the 100^th anniver­sary of his birth, we owe it to his mem­ory to ensure that the spirit of Jacques-Yves Cousteau and his work inspires new gen­er­a­tions,” the explorer’s son said in a state­ment from the Cousteau Society.

The Cousteau Soci­ety and its French equiv­a­lent Equipe Cousteau carry out projects around the world, from the coastal waters of Sudan to a study of the con­di­tion of the Danube River delta. They have estab­lished 14 uni­ver­sity chairs across the globe for the study of the oceans. A spe­cial Cousteau Divers pro­gram is being devel­oped so that recre­ational divers can help con­tribute to aware­ness of the world’s oceans — which make up 72 per­cent of the planet’s sur­face. The launch of the year hon­or­ing Cousteau could not have come at bet­ter time, as the ongo­ing oil spill in the Gulf of Mex­ico has under­scored the impor­tance of ocean con­ser­va­tion, the orga­ni­za­tion said. An early defender of marine life, Cousteau long railed against ocean drilling by the oil indus­try and instead urged “more direct access to the sun’s power.”

11th June, 2010