When cargo ships “swing” in front of Trentemoult: a book on the giants' U-turn

About a hundred times a year, in front of the port of Trentemoult, large cargo ships 90 to 225 metres long turn around in the roadstead in barely fifteen minutes, helped by Loire pilots and tugboats: this is the “évitage”. Three residents, Edmond Guibert, Éric Perraud and Philippe Michel, who have photographed the manoeuvre for more than forty, twenty and ten years respectively, produced the book “Évitage à Trentemoult-les-Isles”, published in November 2021 by Victor Stanne (€20). The ships come to load grain at the Roche-Maurice terminal, the second on the west coast. Presented as a travel notebook, the book explains the manoeuvre, the variety of ships and their flags.