BELGIAN EXPEDITION TO THE GREAT BARRIER REEF (1967)
One of the crew was Henri Moeyaert who sent these pictures of everyone when they arrived home. The ship’s doctor met and married an Australian girl.
Henri seeks a picture of the wedding which was aboard the ship.
David Barnes PhD, now of Townsville, Queensland was part of the expedition. Dave commented to Henri:
I am sorry that I cannot help you with photos taken on the day that Dr Pullinckx was married. I remember that day very well. Also, I visited Gus and his Australian wife in Ostend – and they visited me in the UK.
I think your model of the De Moor is fabulous. I note that you even left the gun out of the forward turret – as it was for the expedition to the GBR (the forward turret was used for storage). I have many times looked to see if there is a commercial model of a Flower class corvette but have never found one.
Note: The Belgian Expedition was primarily to make scientific marine biology films in 35mm underwater. It was a huge and very expensive operation on behalf of a university. Ron Taylor was one of two cinematographers.
Charter boat owner and skipper, Wally Muller assisted with navigation, especially around The Swain Reefs – his home territory.
The expedition visited all the dive locations we know so well today between Lady Elliott Island in the south and Lizard Island in the far north.
Few divers in 1967 had been privileged to see so much of the Great Barrier Reef. It was still largely an unknown frontier underwater.
Editor JHH assisted Wally Muller as a deckhand for part of the expedition, thanks to an invitation from his friends Valerie and Ron Taylor.
Additional ship and dive pictures at: thejohnharding.com
