Princess Diana and Dodi’s ‘love boat’ is now at the bottom of the ocean
03.08.2023 - 17:01
/ nypost.com
The Times of London. Cujo’s current owner is an Italian with a home on the French Riviera.Seven people were onboard at the time of the accident, but they were rescued and got away unharmed. The yacht sank, however, and is now sitting at the bottom of the Mediterranean, at a depth of at least 2,430 meters (8, 200 feet).
“The skipper of the Cujo issued a Mayday,” local police said, according to The Daily Mail. “His ship was sinking due to a leak. Rescue boats were sent from Antibes and, after making sure everyone was safe, gendarmes detected a significant water leak at the level of the starboard front hull.
Her owner had activated the pumps and kept the engines running, but this didn’t stop the boat sinking.”Cujo first became famous in the summer of 1997 when Diana was photographed onboard with her millionaire film producer boyfriend, Fayed – just a few weeks before their tragic and fatal car crash in Paris on Aug. 31, 1997, while they were being pursued by paparazzi. The couple’s photos on the luxury boat were their first pictures together.
Those photos sparked the tabloid furor around Princess Diana and Fayed, who met their tragic demise being chased by paparazzi. A photo of Princess Diana aboard the boat was one of the final images taken before her death at age 36. According to The Times of London, the yacht was first built in Italy in 1972 for John von Neumann, a businessman who made his fortune selling Porsche and Volkswagen cars.
Von Neumann reportedly wanted the world’s fastest yacht. Cujo was able to travel 40 knots per hour. After von Neumann, Cujo was then owned by the son of arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, before it ended up in the hands of his cousin, Dodi Al Fayed.