La paillote Patmar à Dakar (1985-2010)

This book relates, in chronological order, the particular history of these maritime patrol crews who, in the purest spirit of autonomy and adaptation, implemented from Dakar, the ATL 1, then, later, the ATL 2 and finally the Falcon, worthy heirs of the seaplanes and other bombers of the Battle of the Atlantic.

Since the beginning of the 1970s, crews have succeeded each other to carry out search and rescue missions for the benefit of the Senegalese State. Their history is singular, as is the mode of operation of this component of the French Navy. In order to understand the “crew” state of mind that animates this community, it is necessary to go back to its history in the region, before taking a closer look at the characteristics of these very special planes.

Here more than elsewhere, the machines and the missions shape the men and women who implement them and accomplish them with passion.

The methodical work carried out by the author is largely based on his multiple detachments carried out on the ZMCV theater (Zone Maritime du Cap Vert), but also on the testimonies of those who succeeded one another and who left in this place a traces of their passage. This book is the means for the general public to discover these slices of life, past and present, but it is also and above all an opportunity for the former crew members of the DETAERO in Dakar, to rekindle the flame of a memory that often depends on a name or a photo.