The MIO wishes an excellent retirement to Pascal Douillet, IRD research officer of the OPLC team.

Pascal Douillet's retirement party went very well on Thursday, July 9 from 4:00 pm to 7:30 pm. About fifty people from the IRD center and outside the IRD were present, everyone had put on his best Hawaiian shirt.

Pascal appreciated the different surprises that were prepared for him:

A live skype exchange with 4 Mexican colleagues, 2 career retrospectives: the first one by Edouard Hnawia, IRD representative from New Caledonia focused on Pascal's different stays in the centre of Noumea, and the second one by Richard Sempéré on his whole career and on behalf of all the M.I.O. staff.

Then two short films were shown: the first one on the occasion of the visit of the IRD centre by a minister and the second one on the oceanographic mission Bula in Fiji which allowed to model the hydrodynamics of the Suva lagoon.

Finally, thanks to his colleagues, many photos of his career were projected in a slide show that Pascal commented, sometimes with emotion...

Thanks to the generosity of his colleagues, Pascal received many gifts: a photo booklet with the slideshow that everyone was able to sign; 2 plants: an avocado tree from Mexico that Pascal had been looking for a long time, an endemic plant a Captaincookia, a magnificent 1.60 m Melanesian sculpture in a fern trunk; and a superb case of very, very good wines, which Pascal is particularly fond of.

The day ended with a buffet dinner. Thanks to Isabelle Biegala and Mina Vilayleck for the organization of this day.

Good wind to you Pascal on behalf of all MIO colleagues!