diana und dodi yacht

Inside the Superyacht Princess Diana and Dodi Al-Fayed Spent Their Final Vacation On

A look at the vessel that saw the beloved royal’s last vacation.

It was hot gossip, this adventure that the princess took abroad after having finalized her divorce from then Prince Charles less than a year before—something that was hinted at at the end of season 5 of The Crown as Queen Elizabeth is pressed to endorse a vacation a-sea with Fayed and her grandchildren, Prince Harry and Prince William. Diana was famously photographed sitting on the passerelle of this boat. Years later, in real life, Harry described the trip in his memoir, Spare , with fond recollection. “Everything about that trip to St. Tropez was heaven,” he wrote.

While the series was filmed on a lookalike super yacht in Mallorca , the real boat was equally lavish. The 208-foot ship was commissioned by Dodi’s father, former Harrods owner Mohamed Al-Fayed, who brought on naval architect Vincenzo Ruggiero to design it in the late 1980s. It was built by Italian shipyard Codecasa and launched in 1990. The steel and aluminum super yacht boasted nine staterooms that altogether accommodate up to 18 people, in addition to a crew of 26. Amenities included a Jacuzzi, swim platform, sun deck, formal dining room, a bar, and office space. Mohamed had named the yacht Jonikal (it has subsequently been called Sokar and is currently called Bash ) .

Shortly after Diana’s and Dodi’s deaths, Mohamed gave the interior a redesign by H2 Yacht Design and a refit that included extending the hull. He attempted to sell the yacht on a number of occasions, ultimately parting with it in 2014 to an anonymous buyer. The new owner carried out further work, including machinery upgrades, a repaint, and fresh teak decks. In 2021, the yacht came into the hands of Bassim Haidar , the founder of Intercomm and GMT, who gave it a further $9.7 million refit after a reported bridge deck fire—and its current name Bash . It’s now back to turn-key condition after an 18-month remodel completed in April 2023 by marine engineering and management company Capax and boat interior company Bobic Yacht Interiors . It features a beauty salon, massage area, high-tech gym, and a spacious main salon.

In May, Robb Report reported that Bash is available for charter in the Mediterranean starting at $278,000 per week, plus expenses. In June, Haidar listed Bash for $16.8 million, according to Boat International .

There was a second motor yacht named Cujo, which Diana and Fayed also took earlier that summer. It was built in Italy in 1972 for John von Neumann, who commissioned the Italian Baglietto shipyard to build the world's fastest motor yacht. She was given two 18-cylinder engines that allowed it to go as fast as 42 knots. Fayed had bought the boat from his cousin, Saudi businessman and arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi. In August, the Mediterranean Sea reclaimed Cujo, as the 62-foot artifact of Diana’s life hit an unidentified object off Beaulieu-sur-Mer on July 29 and sprang a leak, Vanity Fair reported. The seven people on board were rescued by teams from Antibes and safely returned to shore.

An imitation of Jonikal will feature in The Crown season 6, a set that was intended to visually illuminate the tension between Diana and the royal family. “Diana’s south of France adventure was bright and lovely pastel colors, and her world even in Kensington Palace is optimistic and warm, compared to the queen’s residence at Balmoral, which is very static, with gloomy light and drab colors,” set decorator Alison Harvey tells ELLE DECOR.

Filming on the yacht off the island of Mallorca (a St. Tropez stand-in) required many moving parts with few do-overs. “We brought in the drapes, the artwork, many furnishings,” Harvey explains. “Everything was set in the early ’90s, so we thought hard about the colors and textures that we brought in.” Harvey’s team had just half a day to dress the yacht, and then it was off to sea. “There was no getting on or off after that,” Harvey says, adding that they were “subsumed by the logistics of what we had to achieve and the time we had to do it.”

However painstaking the process, the yacht scenes will offer an intriguing context—though largely fictitious—for the iconic photographs that exist of those final weeks leading up to Diana’s death.

Rachel Silva, the Assistant Digital Editor at ELLE DECOR, covers design, architecture, trends, and anything to do with haute couture. She has previously written for Time, The Wall Street Journal, and Citywire.

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The Crown: The Sad, Strange Details of Princess Diana’s Last Vacation

By Julie Miller

Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed are lounging on the sundeck of a reportedly £15 million yacht in The Crown ’s season six episode “Two Photographs” when Dodi’s domineering father telephones an onboard employee with an urgent question.

“Are they sleeping together?” Mohamed Al Fayed demands to know. 

It’s an audacious question—but Mohamed really was checking in on the couple hourly during this August 1997 cruise, according to Tom Bower , who wrote an unauthorized biography of the billionaire called Fayed. The late princess was aware that these calls were coming in—so much so that she joked to Dodi, “God is calling,” when she heard a ring, according to Dodi’s spiritual healer, Myriah Daniels, who was onboard. In 2007, during the inquest into the 1997 crash that killed the princess, Dodi, and their driver, Henri Paul, Daniels said that this became one of Diana’s inside jokes with Dodi. “They’d both have a giggle,” she said. 

Diana had vacationed with Mohamed, as well as Prince William and Prince Harry, aboard the Jonikal earlier that summer. As depicted in The Crown ’s season six episode “Persona Non Grata,” that first Jonikal vacation featured Jet Skis and a flirtation between Diana and the flotilla of press nearby. 

“The young princes didn’t like [the trip] much,” Tina Brown writes in The Palace Papers. “The flash and excess of [Mohamed’s] hospitality—the groaning buffets and the palatial bathrooms—embarrassed William in particular.” Dodi, who was asked by his father to join the trip midway, did not help matters by making the “oddly flamboyant gesture of renting a disco for William and Harry to enjoy privately,” according to royal biographer Sally Bedell Smith in Diana in Search of Herself.

Mohamed was a controversial figure who long craved social acceptance by the British elite, and hoped a relationship between his son and the recently-divorced Diana would seal the deal. 

During the summer of 1997, the billionaire ordered Dodi to drop everything—including his model fiancée, Kelly Fisher —and romance the late princess. Speaking about Mohamed, Bedell Smith previously told Vanity Fair, “He was really the puppet master behind Dodi and Diana’s very brief, barely more than a month, romance…. Dodi basically did whatever his father told him to do.”

Diana’s association with Mohamed caused serious backlash in the press. “These days, Diana, you are no longer the Teflon Princess,” warned Andrew Morton , the biographer behind her bridge-burning tell-all, Diana: Her True Story, in The Sun. “You might have the run of a £20 million yacht, but your friends and fans see a woman who is drifting on the sea of life, seriously in danger of becoming shipwrecked.” Referring to Diana’s cat-and-mouse game with the paparazzi during that initial trip, columnist Judith Whelan wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald, “Diana has been erratic before. This time, however, she has done it while hosted by one of the most reviled men in Britain.”

Despite the press outrage over her association with Mohamed, Diana agreed to return to the Jonikal for the intimate trip reimagined in “Two Photographs.” “Alone in August and attracted to [Dodi], [a] sympathetic, unthreatening listener, she accepted the invitation for a second trip alone with Dodi to the Jonikal on 31 July,” wrote Bower in Fayed. “Over the next six days…the two frolicked on the sundecks, inside the sumptuous craft and in the sea.”

Dodi indulged Diana with her favorite meals—“which included carrot juice in the morning, fruit at lunch, and fish in the evening, as well as plenty of Champagne, caviar, and pâté de foie gras,” according to Diana in Search of Herself. The music was Diana’s selection as well: George Michael’s 1996 album, Older, the occasional Frank Sinatra tune, and the soundtrack of The English Patient. “Such a marvelous film,” Diana raved to Dodi’s butler, Rene Delorm, according to Fayed. “And you miss the music when you’re watching.”

By David Canfield

By Chris Murphy

By Savannah Walsh

Mohamed’s staff was so attentive to Diana that the Jonikal ’s chief stewardess, Deborah Gribble, could remember the tiniest detail, like that some of Diana’s birth control packets were half-used. Speaking at the inquest, she also confirmed that Dodi and Diana “were clearly having a relationship and were a couple.”

Dodi lavished Diana with gifts during their six-week courtship, including a pearl bracelet, a diamond-studded wristwatch, a silver photo frame, and a gold-and-diamond ring. When the Jonikal docked in Sardinia’s Porto Cervo, according to Brown’s The Diana Chronicles, Diana and Dodi went shopping and returned with cashmere sweaters for the princess—one in every color. 

Mohamed, meanwhile, was busy behind the scenes calling press. News of the relationship between Diana and Dodi broke the first week of August, less than a month before Diana’s death. The Sun ran the news with the headline “Di’s Secret Hol With Harrods Hunk Dodi,” while Mohamed’s publicist touted the relationship as “the romance of the century.”

But by the end of the trip, according to those who knew Diana, she intended their fling to be just that. The late princess suspected that Dodi might propose to her, according to Brown, but she told a friend that an engagement ring would be “going firmly on the fourth finger of my right hand” should it be presented. As recreated in “Two Pictures,” there was “a chaotic evening ashore in Monte Carlo when Dodi suddenly decided to send for the tender and take the princess for a walk.” Rather than going for a romantic stroll, however, Dodi “got her lost after a long pant up a hill trying to evade the paparazzi,” Brown writes. 

It was so embarrassing, she continues, that Trevor Rees-Jones, a bodyguard on Mohamed’s payroll, “began to feel sorry for the princess; he believed she deserved better.”

According to Gribble, Dodi also became impatient with the amount of press attention Diana was receiving.

“The tension was noticeable throughout the trip and increasing as time wore on,” Gribble revealed during the inquest. “By the time we went to Paris, there was real tension. It was incredible. It was all so tense.” 

Days before her fatal accident, Diana called her sister from the Jonikal, confiding that any love spell cast on her earlier had been broken. While she did not get into specifics, Sarah McCorquodale later told the court, “I just did not think the relationship had much longer to go.”

During that final trip on the Jonikal, Diana was photographed sitting alone on a diving board in an aqua swimsuit. The image remains so iconic that, 26 years after it was taken, Netflix recreated the visual in its promotional materials for The Crown ’s sixth season.

Contrary to what the photo showed, though, Diana was never really alone. By the end of the cruise, the princess suspected that Mohamed was doing more than periodically checking in with the Jonikal staff. As McCorquodale revealed during the inquest, “She thought the boat was being bugged by Mr. Al Fayed Senior.”

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Yacht that Princess Diana spent last summer on with Dodi Al-Fayed sinks to bottom of Mediterranean

Cujo, which made front-page news around the world back in the summer of 1997 when Diana was entertained on board a year after her divorce from Prince Charles, went down in 2500m (8200ft) of water.

Thursday 3 August 2023 17:00, UK

A motor yacht used by Princess Diana and her boyfriend Dodi Al-Fayed on their final summer holiday in the South of France before they died in a Paris car crash has sunk.

The 19m (62ft) Cujo went down 21 miles (35km) off Beaulieu-sur-Mer after sending out a mayday call last Saturday.

The seven people on board the luxury vessel, which was taking on water, were rescued by teams from Antibes before it sank to the bottom of the Mediterranean at a depth of 2500m (8200ft).

They were safely returned to shore.

The area was monitored for pollution as the boat sank with 7,000 litres of diesel in its tanks.

Cujo made front page news around the world back in the summer of 1997 when Al-Fayed entertained Diana onboard, a year after her divorce from Prince Charles, which was finalised in August 1996.

That summer, Diana was also photographed on Sokar, the yacht then owned by al Fayed's billionaire father Mohamed.

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It had previously been named Jonikal.

Cujo was built in Italy in 1972 for businessman John von Neumann who told the Italian Baglietto shipyard that he wanted the world's fastest motor yacht.

She was fitted with two 18-cylinder engines giving her a top speed of 42 knots.

Van Neumann then sold the boat to the son of Saudi businessman and arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi and he sold her on to his cousin, al Fayed.

Cujo was frequently moored off St Tropez, a famous celebrity hangout on the French Riviera, with guests including Clint Eastwood, Tony Curtis and Bruce Willis.

Following the death of Diana and Al-Fayed in central Paris on 31 August 1997, Cujo fell into disrepair.

She was decommissioned in 1999, and spent years in storage, before being restored by new owners.

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Diana's last day: Dodi's yacht, a Ritz suite, a diamond ring and relentless photographers

Diana, divorced from Prince Charles after he cheated on her, was the mother of the future king of England and the most photographed woman in the world

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By Michael S. Rosenwald

The last day of Princess Diana’s life began on the top deck of her lover’s yacht, with croissants and fresh jams.

Diana and her beau, Dodi Al Fayed, sipped their coffee marveling at the breathtaking Emerald Coast in Sardinia. Diana took hers with milk. Fayed took his black. There were kiwis, too.

“They were in a good mood,” his butler remembered later. “They were always laughing, holding hands.”

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Their romance was a whirlwind — passionate, thrilling, scandalous. Fayed, the son of Harrod’s department store owner Mohamed Al-Fayed, was a rich playboy. Diana, divorced from Prince Charles after he cheated on her, was the mother of the future king of England and the most photographed woman in the world.

That Saturday — Aug. 30, 1997 — promised to be a moment of change. The princess knew it. She snuck a call to Richard Kay, a friend who covered the Royals for the Daily Mail, and told him, as he later wrote, “she had decided to radically change her life.”

“She was going to complete her obligations to her charities,” Kay continued, “and then, around November, would completely withdraw from her formal public life.” Diana had not told Kay why, but he had a hunch: “They were, to use an old but priceless cliche, blissfully happy. I cannot say for certain that they would have married, but in my view it was likely.”

In the 20 years since she’s been gone, there have been countless revisions to this love story. Her friends and relatives: They weren’t in love! His friends and relatives: They were in love!

Get a dash of perspective along with the trending news of the day in a very readable format.

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Last week, in the Daily Mail, Kay published an article with this headline: “Was Diana about to dump Dodi?” In it, he quoted Diana’s private secretary saying she’d planned to return home after becoming bored with Fayed.

“It’s very much a personal view,” the secretary said, “but I don’t think she would have seen Dodi again once she got back.”

Whatever the case, Fayed wanted to propose that fateful night. It was summer. As they were on holiday, Britain announced plans to invite the Irish Republican Army for peace talks. Conspiracies theories about the suicide of Vincent Foster, President Bill Clinton’s lawyer, were spreading. Israel and Lebanon were sparring with one another.

Fayed’s primary concern was the six-figure diamond ring waiting in Paris. People close to Fayed said the couple picked it out a week earlier even though they had been dating less than a month.

The danger of their relationship wasn’t its brevity. To royal watchers, to Buckingham Palace, and no doubt to the British tabloids whose photographers were hounding them, the threat was something the couple apparently had not yet considered, even as rumours swirled that Diana was already pregnant.

“For the mother of the future king of England to bear the child of a Muslim Arab, a child who would be the half sibling of the heir to the throne, would be embarrassing in the eyes of the royal family and the ruling Establishment,” former Time magazine reporters Tom Sancton and Scott MacLeod wrote in their book, Death of a Princess .

Fayed’s calendar that day had just one entry — at 6:30 p.m., he was to pick up the ring at a store near his father’s hotel in Paris, The Ritz. They left the boat for Fayed’s plane around 11:30 a.m., taking along the butler and a masseuse for Fayed’s painful back.

As soon as they landed in Paris, Fayed saw the paparazzi out his window.

“Dodi did not want this special occasion ruined by a bunch of a shutter-happy cowboys trying to corral them on motorcycles and shoving lenses in their faces,” the ex-Time reporters wrote. “As soon as the door opened, cameras started clicking.”

The aggressiveness of the photographers — and their sheer numbers — would increase as the day progressed.

Diana and Fayed arrived at The Ritz in the late afternoon. She went to the salon for a hair appointment. He went to the jeweler. The couple then rested in the hotel’s Imperial Suite before going to Fayed’s apartment to get dressed for dinner. She checked in with her children, who were in Scotland with Prince Charles and the queen.

“On that Saturday evening, Diana was as happy as I have ever known her,” her friend Kay wrote in the Daily Mail. “For the first time in years, all was well with her world.”

They left for Fayed’s apartment around 7 p.m., trailed by photographers. More were waiting at the building’s front door when they arrived. Fayed fumed. There was an ugly shoving match.

Once inside, Fayed pulled his butler aside, telling him about his plan to propose that night.

“The ring was on the nightstand in his bedroom,” author Christopher Anderson wrote in “The Day Diana Died.” “Dodi had checked to make sure they had several bottles of Dom Pérignon on ice for the big moment.”

But dinner was a bust.

The first restaurant they tried — Chez Benoit, a cozy, casual bistro not far from the city centre – was quickly overrun by photographers. They split and headed for The Ritz, ducking into the dining room hoping to be left alone.

The princess ordered vegetable tempura. Fayed ordered grilled turbot.

“No sooner had they ordered,” the ex-Time reporters wrote, “they began to feel the indiscreet stares of other diners.”

The couple left and had the food delivered to the Imperial Suite. Fayed’s plan was in shambles. They had to get back to the apartment. But how? The hotel was swarming with photographers.

Fayed devised a plan: The couple’s driver and bodyguards would make a big show out front, appearing to get their caravan of Mercedes sedans ready to leave. Meanwhile, the Princess and Fayed would slip out the back door, in a borrowed car driven by a hotel security officer.

What happened next was the subject of lengthy investigations and conspiracy theories that live on today. The couple did get away. But the driver, it turned out, was drunk.

As the couple sped off, the photographers out front got tipped off about the escape, quickly catching up on their motorcycles. Their driver darted in and out of traffic, wrecking spectacularly inside the Pont de l’Alma tunnel near the Eiffel Tower.

Fayed died instantly. Diana died at the hospital.

Her death startled the world.

An up-and-coming anchor named Brian Williams broke into regular coverage on MSNBC to announce the news to Americans in the early morning hours of Aug. 31.

“I’ve just been handed from the Reuters news service what has been marked ‘bulletin,'” Williams said, speaking slowly. “It says, ‘Princess Diana has died.'”

She was 36.

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Yacht used by Princess Diana and lover Dodi Fayed on final summer holiday sinks

Seven people on board were rescued following the accident off the coast of france, article bookmarked.

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The world-famous celebrity yacht used by Princess Diana on her final summer holiday in France has sunk to the bottom of the sea.

Cujo, once also a favourite of Hollywood superstars, disappeared below the Mediterranean waves after hitting an unidentified object off Beaulieu-sur-Mer, on the French Riviera, on Saturday.

Seven people on board were rescued following the accident, but the boat ended up at a depth of almost 2500m around 18 nautical miles off the coast.

“The skipper of the Cujo issued a Mayday,” said one officer. “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.”

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All of those on board, including the Cujo‘s Italian owner, were placed in a rescue boat, and taken back to shore uninjured.

Reports about Cujo - an Indian word that means ‘Unstoppable Force’ - dominated the media in August 1997, when it was owned by Diana’s boyfriend, Dodi Al-Fayed.

The multi-millionaire film producer had spent some £1m refitting the boat, and wooed Diana on board, as the world’s media looked on.

This was shortly before the couple died in a car crash in central Paris caused by their drunk driver.

That summer, Diana was also photographed on Sokar, the yacht then owned by Al-Fayed’s father, retail billionaire Mohamed Al-Fayed.

Cujo was built in Italy in 1972 for businessman John von Neumann after he told Italy’s Baglietto shipyard that he wanted the world’s fastest motor yacht.

She was fitted with two 18-cylinder engines that ensured she had a top speed of 42 knots.

Van Neumann then sold the boat to the son of Adnan Khashoggi, the world’s richest arms dealer, and he sold her on to his cousin, Dodi Al-Fayed.

Cujo was frequently moored off St Tropez, the most famous celebrity hotspot on the Riviera, with celebrity guests including Clint Eastwood, Tony Curtis and Bruce Willis on board.

Following the death of Princess Diana and Mr Al-Fayed, Cujo fell into disrepair.

She was decommissioned in 1999, and spent years in storage, before being restored by new owners.

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Yacht Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed Vacationed on Right Before Their Deaths Sinks in Mediterranean Sea

Seven people were on board at the time of the incident.

A yacht that Princess Diana spent some of her final days on in 1997 recently sank in the Mediterranean Sea. The boat, named Cujo, sunk off the coast of France, The Independent reports. 

The site reports that the boat hit an unidentified object and experienced a leak while sailing near the French Riviera. The seven people on board at the time, including the unidentified current owner of the boat, were rescued, but the boat sunk to the depths of the sea. 

The Gendarmerie des Alpes Maritimes posted photos of the sinking ship on its Facebook page, showing some of the boat's furniture and the guests' belongings that were recovered. It notes that the incident took place on July 29. 

Cujo was previously owned by Princess Diana's boyfriend, Dodi Al-Fayed. The Egyptian film producer was killed in the 1997 car crash that also took Diana's life. The couple were seen vacationing together on the yacht days before their untimely deaths. 

The Independent reports that Cujo has hosted celebrity guests in the past, including Clint Eastwood, Bruce Willis, and Tony Curtis. 

Diana and Dodi's romance following her split from Prince Charles was documented on the most recent season of The Crown . The Netflix royal drama followed the late Princess of Wales' life ahead of her sudden death. It even showed scenes of Diana vacationing with her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry, on a boat with the Al-Fayeds, though it did not specify whether that boat was Cujo. 

Back in January, Prince Harry admitted during an appearance on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert that he has watched the royal drama. At the time, the fifth in line to the British royal throne was promoting his tell-all memoir,  Spare.

"The older stuff and the more recent stuff," Harry confirmed. "Yes I do [fact check it], actually, which, by the way, another reason why it's so important that history has it right."

Harry has spoken about  The Crown  before, telling James Corden in 2021, "They don't pretend to be news, it's fictional. But it's loosely based on the truth. Of course it's not strictly accurate, but loosely. It gives you a rough idea about what the lifestyle, what the pressures of putting duty and service above family and everything else, what can come from that."

"I'm way more comfortable with  The Crown  than I am seeing the stories written about my family, or my wife, or myself," he told Corden. "Because it's the difference between, [ The Crown ] is obviously fiction, take it how you will, but [the tabloid stories] are being reported on as fact, because you're supposedly news. I have a real issue with that."

Updates on Celebrity News, TV, Fashion and More!

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• Princess Diana

clock This article was published more than  6 years ago

Diana’s final hours: Dodi’s yacht, a Ritz suite, a diamond ring and relentless photographers

The last day of Princess Diana’s life began on the top deck of her lover’s yacht, with croissants and fresh jams.

Diana and her beau, Dodi Al Fayed, sipped their coffee marveling at the breathtaking Emerald Coast in Sardinia. Diana took hers with milk. Fayed took his black. There were kiwis, too.

“They were in a good mood,” his butler remembered later. “They were always laughing, holding hands.”

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Their romance was a whirlwind — passionate, thrilling, scandalous. Fayed, the son of Harrod’s department store owner Mohamed Al-Fayed, was a rich playboy. Diana, divorced from Prince Charles after he cheated on her, was the mother of the future King of England and the most photographed woman in the world.

[ How Britain and the world mourned Diana, the ‘People’s Princess’ ]

That Saturday — Aug. 30, 1997 — promised to be a moment of change. The Princess knew it. She snuck a call to Richard Kay, a friend who covered the Royals for the Daily Mail, and told him, as he later wrote , “she had decided to radically change her life.”

“She was going to complete her obligations to her charities,” Kay continued, “and then, around November, would completely withdraw from her formal public life.” Diana had not told Kay why, but he had a hunch: “They were, to use an old but priceless cliche, blissfully happy. I cannot say for certain that they would have married, but in my view it was likely.”

In the 20 years since she’s been gone, there have been countless revisions to this love story. Her friends and relatives: They weren’t in love! His friends and relatives: They were in love!

Last week, in the Daily Mail, Kay published an article with this headline: “Was Diana about to dump Dodi?” In it, he quoted Diana’s private secretary saying she’d planned to return home after becoming bored with Fayed.

“It’s very much a personal view,” the secretary said, “but I don’t think she would have seen Dodi again once she got back.”

Whatever the case, Fayed wanted to propose that fateful night. It was summer. As they were on holiday, Britain announced plans to invite the Irish Republican Army for peace talks. Conspiracies theories about the suicide of Vincent Foster, President Bill Clinton’s lawyer, were spreading. Israel and Lebanon were sparring with one another.

Fayed’s primary concern was the six-figure diamond ring waiting in Paris. People close to Fayed said the couple picked it out a week earlier even though they had been dating less than a month.

The danger of their relationship wasn’t its brevity. To royal watchers, to Buckingham Palace, and no doubt to the British tabloids whose photographers were hounding them, the threat was something the couple apparently had not yet considered, even as rumors swirled that Diana was already pregnant.

“For the mother of the future king of England to bear the child of a Muslim Arab, a child who would be the half sibling of the heir to the throne, would be embarrassing in the eyes of the royal family and the ruling Establishment,” former Time magazine reporters Tom Sancton and Scott MacLeod wrote in their book,  “Death of a Princess.”

Fayed’s calendar that day had just one entry — at 6:30 p.m., he was to pick up the ring at a store near his father’s hotel in Paris, The Ritz. They left the boat for Fayed’s plane around 11:30 a.m., taking along the butler and a masseuse for Fayed’s painful back.

As soon as they landed in Paris, Fayed saw the paparazzi out his window.

“Dodi did not want this special occasion ruined by a bunch of a shutter-happy cowboys trying to corral them on motorcycles and shoving lenses in their faces,” the ex-Time reporters wrote. “As soon as the door opened, cameras started clicking.”

Diana and the media: She used them, and they used her. Until the day she died.

The aggressiveness of the photographers — and their sheer numbers — would increase as the day progressed.

Diana and Fayed arrived at The Ritz in the late afternoon. She went to the salon for a hair appointment. He went to the jeweler. The couple then rested in the hotel’s Imperial Suite before going to Fayed’s apartment to get dressed for dinner. She checked in with her children, who were in Scotland with Prince Charles and the Queen.

“On that Saturday evening, Diana was as happy as I have ever known her,” her friend Kay wrote in the Daily Mail. “For the first time in years, all was well with her world.”

They left for Fayed’s apartment around 7 p.m., trailed by photographers. More were waiting at the building’s front door when they arrived. Fayed fumed. There was an ugly shoving match.

Once inside, Fayed pulled his butler aside, telling him about his plan to propose that night.

“The ring was on the nightstand in his bedroom,” author Christopher Anderson wrote in “The Day Diana Died.” “Dodi had checked to make sure they had several bottles of Dom Pérignon on ice for the big moment.”

But dinner was a bust.

The first restaurant they tried — Chez Benoit, a cozy, casual bistro not far from the city center — was quickly overrun by photographers. They split and headed for The Ritz, ducking into the dining room hoping to be left alone.

The Princess ordered vegetable tempura. Fayed ordered grilled turbot.

“No sooner had they ordered,” the ex-Time reporters wrote, “they began to feel the indiscreet stares of other diners.”

JFK’s last birthday: Gifts, champagne and wandering hands on the presidential yacht

The couple left and had the food delivered to the Imperial Suite. Fayed’s plan was in shambles. They had to get back to the apartment. But how? The hotel was swarming with photographers.

Fayed devised a plan: The couple’s driver and bodyguards would make a big show out front, appearing to get their caravan of Mercedes sedans ready to leave. Meanwhile, the Princess and Fayed would slip out the back door, in a borrowed car driven by a hotel security officer.

What happened next was the subject of lengthy investigations and conspiracy theories that live on today. The couple did get away. But the driver, it turned out, was drunk.

As the couple sped off, the photographers out front got tipped off about the escape, quickly catching up on their motorcycles. Their driver darted in and out of traffic, wrecking spectacularly inside the Pont de l’Alma tunnel near the Eiffel Tower.

Fayed died instantly. Diana died at the hospital.

Her death startled the world.

An up-and-coming anchor named Brian Williams broke into regular coverage on MSNBC to announce the news to Americans in the early morning hours of Aug. 31.

“I’ve just been handed from the Reuters news service what has been marked ‘bulletin,’” Williams said, speaking slowly. “It says, ‘Princess Diana has died.’”

She was 36.

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The true story behind Princess Diana's iconic yacht photo

All you need to know about the iconic photo of the late princess of wales that went around the globe.

Princess Diana was always a fashion icon , we can never forget her legendary 'revenge' dress , but one of her best-known looks was snapped when she holidayed on the Jonikal yacht with the al-Fayed family, scenes which were immortalised in the fifth and sixth seasons of The Crown .

The holiday that Diana enjoyed, alongside sons Prince William and Prince Harry , would be her last before she was tragically killed in a car accident in 1997. One of the most memorable photos saw the late Princess of Wales sat on the yacht's diving board looking out over the sea.

Even though the photo of Diana in the teal swimsuit is now one of the most poignant photos of the late royal, how much do you know of the story behind it? Read on to find out all you need to know…

Why was Diana on the yacht?

Princess Diana had become friends with the businessman Mohamed al-Fayed, with the pair reportedly meeting a polo match before becoming friends. Following her divorce from the then Prince Charles and the ending of her relationship with heart surgeon Dr. Hasnat Khan, Mohamed invited Diana to join him and his family on a trip to St Tropez, in southern France.

Ahead of the trip, Diana had been in Milan to attend the funeral of fashion designer and friend Gianna Versace, who had been murdered by Andrew Cunanan. The late royal later travelled to Sarajevo, in Bosnia, to highlight the issue of landmines in the country. During her time in the city, she met with people who had been injured by the mines.

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The trip would end up being Diana's first time meeting Dodi al-Fayed, and the filmmaker's then-girlfriend, Kelly Fisher, was allegedly on the trip.

Who took the photo?

On 10 August, paparazzi photos were published in the Sunday Mirror showing Princess Diana and Dodi sharing a kiss, which intensified media presence around the couple and their holiday. Paparazzi photographers began renting dinghies to try and get new photos of the royal, with some even going for prices up to £1million.

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INSIDE STORY:  The time Princess Diana called a journalist to her home after reading an article she didn't like

It's ultimately unknown which photographer grabbed the photo of Diana on the side of the yacht, which was published on 24 August, a week before Diana died. The snap saw the Princess in her teal swimsuit sat at the end of the yacht's diving board, with a life ring floating in the water beneath her.

See below for more images of Diana on the Jonikal…

Diana and Dodi

Diana and Dodi grew close on the trip, and in this photo the pair shared an intimate moment as they relaxed in the sun together.

Diana with the al-Fayed family

The late Princess of Wales had been invited on the trip by Mohamed al-Fayed, and she enjoyed the businessman's company during her time onboard.

Diana in blue

Diana favoured the teal swimsuit during her time in St Tropez.

Diana's paparazzi moment

The royal was aware of the media presence, and she light-heartedly teased photographers in this photo, mimicking a pair of binoculars with her hands.

Diana stretches

The mum-of-two also brought this stunning green and blue one-piece with her on the trip, and in this photo she enjoyed some morning stretches on the yacht's deck.

Diana's family moment

Diana didn't go on the holiday alone, and she also enjoyed time with her sons Prince William and Prince Harry, and a young Harry can be seen here with his mum while she spoke to someone on the phone.

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Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed’s Former Yacht Sinks Off the Coast of France

By Katherine McLaughlin

Before their untimely deaths in the late summer of 1997, Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed spent a few brief paparazzi-festered weeks aboard Cujo, a 65-foot, military-style superyacht. As Robb Report described it, the boat was once the most famous in the world thanks to her high-profile passengers. Now, a little over a quarter of a century later, the infamous boat has sunk off the coast of France, reports The Independent .  

The boat sank quickly after the distress call was made. 

According to a Facebook post from the Gendarmerie des Alpes-Maritimes, a division of the French military, passengers issued a distress call around 12:30 local time on July 29. A little under an hour later, a rescue boat arrived, finding the vessel’s bow already partially submerged. “The cabins of the yacht were already flooded, and only a few suitcases located in the kitchen and on the deck could be retrieved by the gendarmes,” reads the statement. The seven passengers who were on board had already evacuated and were safely on a nearby lifeboat. Rescuers and passengers then quickly left the area, as the boat sank 2,500 feet to the ocean’s floor. The cause of the accident was not shared; however, according to Boat International , sources claimed that the ship hit an unknown object floating near the center of the hull. 

Cujo was already halfway underwater when rescuers arrived. 

The impressive yacht was originally launched in 1972, commissioned by its first owner John von Neumann. According to Robb Report, Von Neumann hired Italian shipyard Baglietto to build him a boat that was “faster than any other motoryacht on the water.” During its maiden voyage, Cujo had largely achieved this goal thanks to its twin 54-liter V-18 turbo diesel engines, which provided 2,700 horsepower and allowed it to easily hit 46 miles per hour. Von Neumann eventually sold the boat to arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, who later passed the boat to Dodi Fayed, his nephew. 

At one point, the vessel was among the fastest in the world. 

Though Princess Diana was among the most notable guests onboard—largely fueled by vicious tabloid coverage—other high-profile passengers hosted by Fayed included Clint Eastwood, Tony Curtis, Bruce Willis, and Brooke Shields. In addition to jaunts on Cujo, the sensationalized couple also spent time on superyacht Jonikal , which most recently sold in June of 2023. Following the passing of Di and Fayed, Cujo fell into disrepair and decommissioned in 1999. After many years in storage, Fayed’s cousin Moody Al-Fayed purchased the vessel and brought it back to life. He later sold the boat to Simon Kidston, a British car collector and restorer and the last-reported owner of the vessel. 

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By Michelle Duncan

Inside The Yacht Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed Toured the Mediterranean On

The princess and her paramour vacationed on the yacht shortly before their tragic deaths in 1997.

Just a month before their passing, Diana and Dodi—joined for part of the trip by her sons, Prince William and Prince Harry—traveled the South of France aboard a superyacht. Then named the Jonikal (it has subsequently been called the Sokar , and the Bash ), the yacht was owned by Dodi's father, former Harrods owner Mohamed Al Fayed , when Diana traveled on it. Following the 1997 car crash that led to the couple's deaths, Mohamed attempted to sell the yacht on a number of occasions before ultimately parting with it in 2014.

In 2022, it was announced that the 208-foot yacht, which saw the beloved royal's last vacation, would be going up for sale. According to Boat International , the vessel sold in June of 2023 following a €9 million refit.

The ship, which was first launched in 1990, reportedly has nine staterooms to hold up to 12 guests with amenities including a jacuzzi, swim platform, sun deck, formal dining room, a bar, and office space. Though the ultimate sale price for the vessel has not been revealed, the asking price was reportedly €15,500,000.

Lauren Hubbard is a freelance writer and Town & Country contributor who covers beauty, shopping, entertainment, travel, home decor, wine, and cocktails.

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‘The Crown’: Behind the Photo of an Embrace That Changed Princess Diana’s Life

In the show, Mohamed al-Fayed sends the photographer Mario Brenna to capture shots of Diana and al-Fayed’s son, Dodi, on vacation. The portrayal is inaccurate, Brenna says.

By Alex Marshall

Reporting from London

It’s summer 1997, and Princess Diana is flirting with Dodi Fayed, a globe-trotting playboy, on the Jonikal, a yacht floating on sparkling Mediterranean waters.

Diana, teasingly, says that she likes men who have lips that are “just the right temperature.”

“Are mine the right temperature?” Dodi replies.

“I don’t know,” Diana says: “Need to check.” Then, the couple kiss, blissfully unaware that just a few meters away, Mario Brenna, a slick Italian photographer, is on a boat, with a long-lens camera trained on the couple.

A few days later, Brenna’s shots of the princess and her new beau are on the front pages of newspapers worldwide.

This is a central scene in the sixth and final season of Netflix’s royal drama “The Crown” — the first batch of episodes premiered on Thursday — and a moment that signaled the start of a tabloid frenzy around the couple that many blame for their deaths on Aug. 31, 1997, in a car crash in Paris as they were chased by photographers.

Yet the depiction is far from accurate, according to Brenna, speaking in what he said was his first interview with an English-language newspaper.

For a start, “The Crown” has Mohamed al-Fayed — Dodi’s father, and a retail and hotel tycoon who died this year — appearing to hire Brenna to take the shots, in an effort to push Diana and Dodi’s relationship into the public eye, and cajole the pair to marry.

In an email, Annie Sulzberger, the head of research for the show — she is also the sister of The Times’s publisher, A.G. Sulzberger — said that “there are a few theories about how Brenna managed to find the Jonikal moored somewhere in the Mediterranean Sea,” but the one the team found most credible was that one of al-Fayed’s employees leaked the boat’s location to Brenna.

But Brenna said the idea that al-Fayed hired him was “absurd and completely invented,” and that no one leaked information about the yacht’s whereabouts to him. Every summer at that time, he was in Sardinia so he could take paparazzi shots of famous people, he said, and coming across Diana and Dodi was simply a “great stroke of luck.”

On Aug. 1, 1997, Brenna said he approached Diana’s yacht on a fast moving inflatable boat after mistaking a blonde woman making a telephone call on its upper deck for an old acquaintance. As he got closer, he was stunned to realize it was the princess.

Bruno Malka, Brenna’s agent at the time who helped sell the images to Paris Match magazine, said in an email that he thought Brenna was familiar with the yacht, “without knowing it was Diana and Dodi” onboard that day. Brenna was successful, Malka added, because he had spent so many years working in the region.

After spotting the couple, Brenna said he spent the next few days stalking the boat, including climbing a cliff to get a better view. From that elevated position, about 400 meters away from Diana, he took several photos of Diana and Dodi in an embrace. The shots were almost blurred, Brenna said, because the heat haze meant he struggled to get the pair in focus.

Still, he knew immediately he’d secured “a historic photo.” He’d also captured an image that “solved my personal and family problems,” he said, at a time when he had recently divorced and so “was not swimming in wealth.”

He unloaded the rolls of film from the camera, then buried them to make sure they didn’t get exposed to the sun as he tried to take more images, and also as he feared a competitor might have seen him at work and try to steal his camera and so obtain the images every other photographer in the Mediterranean had been hoping to get first.

On Aug. 10, the Sunday Mirror, a British tabloid, splashed Brenna’s image on its front page . “The Kiss,” the headline read. Soon, Brenna said, he was selling the pictures worldwide. In the following six-to-eight months, he said, he made about 1.7 million pounds, or $2.1 million, from his photos of the couple.

Brenna’s pictures — and the prices news outlets paid for them — sparked a frenzy. In 2013, Jason Fraser, a British photographer who helped Brenna sell his images, told The Daily Mail that after they were published, over 2,000 photographers arrived in the Mediterranean hoping to get their own snaps of Diana and Dodi. “I felt the whole thing was spinning out of control,” Fraser said. Weeks later, the couple died.

In “The Crown,” Brenna (portrayed by Enzo Cilenti) explains his methods to camera. To capture celebrities misbehaving, the fictional Brenna says, you have to take risks. Paparazzi also have to act like “hunters … killers.”

Brenna said in the email interview that he did not share this opinion of his work (“I do not identify with the term ‘killer,’”) and that he was never contacted by anyone from “The Crown” to learn about his experiences (Netflix did not respond to a request for comment).

After Diana and Dodi’s death, al-Fayed sued Fraser, the British photographer, for taking photos of Diana and Dodi on a boat, saying it was an invasion of privacy. Brenna said he did not face any such action, adding his images were legal as they “were taken outdoors, in a public place.” And he regretted the privacy crackdown that happened since, with governments and stars trying to stop the paparazzi from taking photos: “There is still the right to report,” he said.

Today, Brenna lives near Lake Como, in Italy, where he said he’s photographed celebrities including George Clooney, Miley Cyrus and Beyoncé, even as the dawn of social media had impacted his profession significantly, including its financial rewards.

Brenna said he and his family enjoyed the success of the photos throughout August 1997. But then, Diana died. When he heard the news, Brenna said, he “couldn’t believe it” and cried, not least because he had two children himself and so could understand what her death would mean for Diana’s boys. He made a decision “not to speak or disclose anything about the incident until William and Harry reached adulthood.”

The mere thought that his images “could have contributed to fueling the hunt for Diana and Dodi obviously saddens me,” Brenna said. But he did not think his work added significantly to the furor around the princess.

“If it hadn’t been me,” he added, “someone else would certainly have captured those images.”

Alex Marshall is a European culture reporter, based in London. More about Alex Marshall

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Boat of the Week: Meet ‘Cujo,’ the 80-Foot Yacht Where Late Movie Producer Dodi Al-Fayed Once Wooed Princess Diana

The couple spent some of their final summer cruising around saint-tropez aboard this fast, military-looking yacht., howard walker, howard walker's most recent stories.

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For a few brief weeks back in the summer of 1997, Cujo was the most famous boat in the world.

Not because of her intimidating military lines, or blistering 40-knot performance. It’s because Diana, Princess of Wales, hung out aboard in Saint-Tropez with the boat’s owner, and romantic partner Dodi Al-Fayed.

Countless paparazzi shots show the once future Queen of England on Cujo‘s narrow sidedecks, soaking up the Mediterranean sun. By the end of August that year, both Diana and Dodi would be dead after that fatal car wreck in Paris.

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Diana, Princess of Wales and Dodi Fayed spent some of their final summer cruising around Saint-Tropez aboard Cujo .  Courtesy Patrick Bar-Nice Matin/AP Images

Yet this rakish 80-footer was a headliner long before Diana stepped on board. Her first owner was Austrian Johnny Von Neumann, an entrepreneur, playboy and passionate sports-car racer who became the largest Porsche-VW distributor in the US.

In 1972, Von Neumann commissioned the Italian shipyard Baglietto to build him a boat with one goal: It had to go fast—faster than any other motoryacht on the water. To deliver, the shipyard installed twin 54-liter V-18 turbo diesels delivering a combined 2,700 horsepower.

Flat out, Cujo —said to be an ancient Indian word meaning “unstoppable force”—could easily top 40 knots, or 46 mph. Von Neumann blasted up and down the Cote d’Azur for a few years before ordering an even faster Baglietto—this time with jet turbine power. He sold Cujo to arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi who, at the time, was reckoned to be the richest man in the world.

The fast, military exterior gives way to an almost old-fashioned cockpit with wood cabinets and leather seats.  Courtesy Simon Kidston

Khashoggi eventually passed the boat on to his nephew Dodi Al-Fayed, who immediately sent her to the CARM shipyard in Lavagna, Italy, for a full refit.

Back in Saint-Tropez, and moored in her reserved spot on the town’s main quay outside the famed Le Sénéquier restaurant, Fayed would invite many of his Hollywood friends for a cruise. During the summers, everyone from Clint Eastwood, Tony Curtis, Bruce Willis and one-time girlfriend, Brooke Shields, were seen aboard.

Following Dodi and Diana’s death, Cujo quickly fell into disrepair. Decommissioned in 1999, she was hauled out at the CARM yard and spent several years in storage.

The main salon is smaller than many contemporary 80-foot motoryachts, but few other boats its size have the same 40-knots-plus top end.  Courtesy Simon Kidston

The boat was eventually rescued by Dodi’s cousin Moody Al-Fayed, who spent over $1 million bringing her back to life. Part of the work included uprating those massive diesels to deliver 1,650 hp each.

Now fast forward to February last year. After two summers of cruising Cujo around Sardinia and Italy’s Amalfi coast, Moody decided to sell. Strangely, he entered the boat in the Retromobile classic car auction in Paris.

That’s where well-known British car collector, buyer, seller and restorer Simon Kidston appeared. Kidston had spied Cujo in the Retromobile auction catalog, read that it was being sold by his old school-friend Fayed, and decided to bid.

The 1972 Baglietto has innovative features like the amidships helm and social area, and two sunbeds on the foredeck.  Courtesy Simon Kidston

“On the day of the auction, I was tied up with clients so asked a colleague to go down and take a look. I told him that if it was going cheaply, put in a bid for a bit of fun,” Kidston tells Robb Report .

“The bidding opened at just 150,000 Euros—that’s around $165,000. My colleague bid 160,000 Euros,” says Kidston. “Trouble was, no one else bid. The hammer went down and I had bought a boat. The feeling was a mix of excitement, tinged with terror.”

Unfortunately, just as Simon took delivery of Cujo at Lavagna, where she was moored, Europe was starting to lock down with the coronavirus pandemic.

The internal helm station is outfitted with modern electronics, but in a nod to its historic past, the wheel is definitely old school.  Courtesy Simon Kidston

But he did get to take her out during a video shoot in and around Portofino  for his YouTube channel Kidston Productions, where the boat meets up with Simon’s own ’70s Lamborghini Miura supercar. Entitled A Portofino Affair, the footage of Cujo at speed is breathtaking.

“She has immense presence,” said Kidston. “No boat of its size commands that kind of attention when she comes into a harbor.” Especially an Italian harbor when nervous local boat owners think she’s with the financial police.

“As you’d expect, those engines have tons and tons of performance,” Kidston adds. “We’ve seen 41 knots. But they have a very different sound than I was expecting; instead of a roar from the exhausts, there’s this amazing whistle from the turbos.”

The diesel engines were upgraded from the original 2,700 to 3,300 horsepower.  Courtesy Simon Kidston

While Kidston and his family had planned to cruise the Med this summer, the car enthusiast received an offer he couldn’t refuse.

“A young member of a prominent Italian business family—he’s 30 years old—had seen Cujo in Lavagna, fallen in love with her and asked if she was for sale,” he says. “He took delivery last week, just in time for his birthday.”

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A complete timeline of Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed's summer romance

Photos of Diana and Dodi on a memorial in Harrods.Sion Touhig/Sygma via Getty Images

• Princess Diana was dating film producer Dodi Fayed before they were killed in a car crash in 1997.
• The couple met in 1986 but they wouldn't start dating until more than a decade later.

Princess Diana spent her final summer in a brief whirlwind romance with Dodi Fayed .

Fayed was a film producer and son of Mohamed Al-Fayed, a wealthy entrepreneur and former owner of the London department store Harrods.

Following the princess' divorce from Prince Charles the year prior, Diana vacationed with Dodi in St. Tropez and Paris in July and August of 1997. They were photographed kissing on Mohamed's luxury yacht, revealing their relationship to the public.

The couple were killed in a car accident in Paris on August 31, 1997. Here's a complete timeline of their fleeting relationship.

Princess Diana reportedly met Dodi at a polo match in 1986, when she was still married to the then-titled Prince Charles.

Diana and Dodi were first introduced at a polo match in Windsor in 1986, according to Dodi's obituary published by The Independent in September 1997. Dodi and his family were playing against Diana's then-husband, Prince Charles — who she had been married to since 1981 — the publication's Tom Vallance reported.

That same year, Dodi married the model Suzanne Gregard, according to the obituary. They were married for eight months and Gregard was granted more than £2 million, or around $2.4 million, in the divorce settlement, the outlet added.

Diana and Dodi's relationship didn't become romantic until more than a decade later after Diana and Charles' divorce, according to The Independent.

Charles and Diana separated in 1992 and divorced in 1996.

As Business Insider previously reported , the couple's separation was announced by then-Prime Minister John Major in 1992 following rumors that Charles had an affair with Camilla Parker Bowles, which he admitted in a TV documentary interview in 1994.

Speaking to filmmaker Jonathan Dimbleby , Charles said he was "faithful and honorable" to Diana until their marriage "became irretrievably broken down, us both having tried."

In August 1996, the divorce was finalized and Diana was awarded a $22.5 million lump settlement in addition to an annual payment of $600,000 toward the maintenance of her offices, according to the princess' obituary in The New York Times.

Speaking to filmmaker Jonathan Dimbleby , Charles said he was faithful and honorable to Diana until their marriage became irretrievably broken down, us both having tried.

Dodi met model Kelly Fisher in July 1996 and the pair were reportedly engaged when he met Diana.

Dodi met the British model Kelly Fisher in Paris in July 1996, The Los Angeles Times reported in 1997 . Speaking to the world's media at a press conference in August 1997, Fisher's lawyer, Gloria Allred, alleged that Dodi had asked Fisher's parents for their blessing to marry her, and they were due to wed the following year, according to the publication.

Allred said that Fisher was still engaged to Dodi when he started dating Diana. Dodi never publicly commented on Fisher's allegations.

"We would like the princess, who has suffered greatly in the past, to know of Ms. Fisher's experiences with Mr. Fayed so that she can make an informed decision regarding her future and that of her children," Allred said during the press conference, according to The Los Angeles Times.

We would like the princess, who has suffered greatly in the past, to know of Ms. Fisher's experiences with Mr. Fayed so that she can make an informed decision regarding her future and that of her children, Allred said during the press conference, according to The Los Angeles Times.

Diana and Dodi made several public appearances together in the summer of 1997.

Following Diana's divorce, she was tied to a number of high-profile men, including Hasnat Ahmad Khan and Bryan Adams, BI previously reported.

According to Dodi's obituary in The Independent, Diana and Dodi's relationship began after the princess and her children, Prince William and Prince Harry, joined the Fayed family for a vacation in St. Tropez in July 1997.

Diana and Dodi were seen on the luxury yacht owned by his father, Mohamed, with Diana's children, and a second time on their own, according to a 2017 report by The Guardian's Caroline Davies . During the second outing, the couple were pictured kissing by the paparazzi, and news of their apparent relationship became public, the outlet reported.

Fisher filed a lawsuit against Dodi a couple of weeks before his death in August 1997.

In August, Fisher's lawyer, Gloria Allred, announced the model's intention to sue Dodi for breach of contract after photos of Diana and Dodi were made public, according to The Los Angeles Times.

The publication reported that the lawsuit alleged Dodi had offered Fisher $500,000 to relocate to Paris and to slow down with her modeling work, in addition to promising her a new family home in Malibu's Paradise Cove.

Diana and Dodi were killed in a car crash on August 31, 1997.

Following their vacation in St. Tropez, Diana's children returned to the UK to spend the remainder of the summer with Charles. Meanwhile, Diana and Dodi visited Paris.

According to The Guardian and a 1997 BBC News report , the couple were staying at the Ritz Hotel, which was owned by Dodi's father at the time. After leaving the hotel, the couple were pursued by paparazzi and were killed after the car they were traveling in crashed into a tunnel.

The driver of the car, Henri Paul, was also killed. According to BBC News, blood tests proved that he had consumed a "large amount of alcohol" and drugs before the crash.

Diana's bodyguard, Trevor Rees-Jones, was the only survivor, BBC News reported.

The driver of the car, Henri Paul, was also killed. According to BBC News, blood tests proved that he had consumed a large amount of alcohol and drugs before the crash.

Diana and Dodi were mourned around the world.

Following the announcement of the couple's deaths, tens of thousands of flowers were laid by the public at Diana's Kensington Palace residence, The Guardian reported.

The couple was honored with a statue at Harrods, a luxury department store in London that was owned by Dodi's father Mohamed at the time.

Mohamed sold the store to Qatar Holdings in May 2010, according to his obituary published by Sky News in September 2023. And speaking to the Daily Mail in April 2018, Mohamed said the statue had been relocated to his home in Surrey.

"It is a blessing and a comfort to have the statue of Dodi and Princess Diana in the privacy of our family home after having shared it with the public for so many years in Harrods," Mohamed told the publication.

Mohamed died on September 1, 2023, which was one day after the 26th anniversary of his son's death, according to the Sky News obituary. He was 94.

It is a blessing and a comfort to have the statue of Dodi and Princess Diana in the privacy of our family home after having shared it with the public for so many years in Harrods, Mohamed told the publication.

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'The Crown' season 6 recreates famous photographs of Princess Diana, Dodi Fayed, and King Charles. Here is how they compare to the real photos.

• "The Crown" season six recreates the first public photos of Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed kissing.
• It also recreates snaps from King Charles' photo shoot with his sons, Princes William and Harry.
• Here is how the drama's recreations compare to the real photos.

"The Crown" is back for a sixth and final season.

The first four episodes focus on the final months of Princess Diana's life as she begins dating Dodi Fayed, with whom she died in a tragic car crash in Paris in August 1997.

The second episode of season six, "Two Photographs," contrasts two key moments that took place in the summer of 1997.

The first is the media frenzy that ensued when the UK's Sunday Mirror newspaper published the first photos of Diana and Dodi kissing on a yacht in Sardinia.

The second is a photo shoot depicting Prince Charles and his sons, Princes William and Harry , having a much more subdued vacation at Balmoral Castle in Scotland.

Here's how "The Crown" depicts the moments — and what they looked like in real life.

On August 10, 1997, the UK's Sunday Mirror published the very first photograph of Diana and Dodi kissing on its front page. The headline? "The Kiss."

The photographs of Diana and Dodi were taken by Italian photographer Mario Brenna.

The Sunday Mirror published a 10-page spread of Brenna's photos, which it called "the most sensational pictures ever."

Under the headline was the text: "Now Dodi flies off to buy an engagement ring for Diana."

Here's how the front page was faithfully recreated in "The Crown."

In the show, a teenage Prince William (Rufus Kampa) is shown covertly reading the newspaper in his room, which causes him to grow concerned about his mother's relationship with Dodi.

Viewers also see the moment Diana and Dodi share the kiss, not realizing that a photographer is nearby.

After the explosive Diana photos were published, King Charles took part in a photo shoot with Princes William and Harry at Balmoral on August 12, 1997.

In "The Crown," the photo shoot is depicted as a response to the photos of Diana and Dodi in an effort to show Charles in a more sympathetic light to the British public.

Here's how the photo shoot is recreated in the show.

In "The Crown," Charles' aides hire the mild-mannered Scottish photographer Duncan Muir to take the photos. However, it appears that the character was invented for the purposes of the series.

In truth, the photo shoot, which took place during the royals' annual vacation to Balmoral, was attended by a number of Fleet Street photographers, per The Telegraph .

Princes William and Harry did indeed skip stones across the water, as shown in "The Crown."

And here they are with their pet dog.

"The Crown" takes some creative license when it comes to depicting how British newspapers ran these photos.

Charles' jaunt with his two sons is shown dominating the front pages of British newspapers — but this never happened.

In the show, the photo of the princes appears on the front page of The Mirror the day after they're released as a "royal world picture exclusive."

In reality, the photos didn't make such a splash that day. Instead, a story about Diana took the prime spot.

"Di and Dodi fly to psychic Rita," the front page of The Mirror read on August 13, 1997.

The pictures of the princes were featured in the newspaper but on pages eight and nine , showing that the tame photoshoot was no match for the public's appetite for updates about Dodi and Diana's romance.

Likewise, The Daily Record didn't feature the photos on the front page. Its coverage also noted how "embarrassed" William and Harry looked.

The Daily Record ran the photos on page five, instead choosing to dedicate the front page to a story that interested readers more: dustmen who had gone on strike to support a colleague accused of hitting a love rival with a wheelie bin.

The newspaper also commented on how William and Harry looked in the photos, with a subheading that read: "Young princes look embarrassed by dad's Harry Lauder image," per the British Newspaper Archive.

Disclosure: Mathias Döpfner, CEO of Business Insider's parent company, Axel Springer, is a Netflix board member.

• Main content

Yacht von Diana und Dodi Al-Fayed gesunken

2500 Meter in die Tiefe : Dianas „Liebes-Yacht“ im Mittelmeer gesunken

Gleich zwei Yachten standen im Sommer 1997 im Mittelpunkt des Interesses der Weltöffentlichkeit: die Jonikal und die Cujo. Auf der ersten, gut 60 Meter langen Yacht entstanden die Bilder, die Diana beim Sonnenbaden und Küssen ihres neuen Freundes Dodi Al-Fayed zeigten. Auf der zweiten, etwas kleineren verbrachten die Prinzessin und der ägyptische Geschäftsmann ihre letzten Urlaubstage im August 1997, kurz bevor sie nach Paris flogen, wo sie am 31. des Monats mit dem Auto tödlich verunglückten.

Beide Yachten gehörten damals der Familie Al-Fayed, beide wurden später verkauft und gerieten nahezu in Vergessenheit. Auch die Gendarmen der Marine, die am Samstag einem Notruf auf hoher See etwa 35 Kilometer vor der Küste von Beaulieu/Mer folgten, wussten zunächst nicht, welches Schiff da vor ihren Augen unterging. Die sieben Personen an Bord konnten gerettet werden, wie die Gendarmerie des Alpes-Mari­times mitteilte. Die 19 Meter lange Yacht, die offenbar bei einem Zusammenstoß mit einem bisher unbekannten Objekt leckgeschlagen war, liegt nun auf dem Meeresgrund in 2500 Meter Tiefe. An Bord, in den Tanks, sollen noch 7000 Liter Diesel sein.

Clint Eastwood und Bruce Willis als Gäste

Die Cujo hatte der amerikanische Rennfahrer John von Neumann 1972 bei der italienischen Werft Baglietto in Auftrag gegeben. Er wollte mit ihr die schnellste Yacht der Welt besitzen, wie es heißt. Die Yacht schaffte immerhin 42 Knoten (knapp 80 Kilometer in der Stunde). Von Neumann verkaufte sie in den Achtzigerjahren an den Sohn des Waffenhändlers Adnan Khashoggi, der sie einige Jahre später wiederum an Dodi Al-Fayed veräußerte. Er baute sie für eine Million Pfund nach seinen Wünschen um. Gäste an Bord der Cujo, die ihren Heimathafen in den Neunzigern in Saint-Tropez hatte, waren unter anderen die Hollywood-Schauspieler Clint Eastwood , Tony Curtis und Bruce Willis.

Nach Al-Fayeds Unfalltod lag seine Yacht lange ungenutzt im Hafen, bis sie vor drei Jahren von dem britischen Oldtimerhändler Simon Kidston bei einer Auktion für nur 138.000 Pfund (damals etwa 160.000 Euro) ersteigert wurde. Aktueller Besitzer war laut Kidston allerdings ein junger, namentlich nicht genannter Italiener, der sich die Motoryacht kürzlich zu seinem 30.  Geburtstag gekauft haben soll. Er war auch an Bord, als sie nun unterging.

Princess Diana and Dodi Fayed's South of France superyacht is up for sale

By Dora Davies-Evitt

Diana, Princess Of Wales is seen in St Tropez in the summer of 1997

Since her death in August 1997, the late Diana, Princess of Wales's last months have been described as some of her happiest. During the weeks before the tragic car accident that would kill them both, the princess took a blissful tour through the Mediterranean aboard a superyacht with her boyfriend, Dodi Fayed. At the time, a photograph of the pair kissing atop the vessel's sun deck made headlines around the world. Now, 25 years on, the multi-million-pound boat, which is loaded with memories of the princess's final summer, is up for sale. 

The luxury vessel was bought by Mohamed Al-Fayed, former owner of Harrods and father of Fayed. Following the death of his son, Al-Fayed attempted to sell the yacht several times before it was finally purchased in 2014. Most recently the boat was owned by billionaire entrepreneur Bassim Haidar, who apparently has a ‘great affection for the ocean’. With reported plans to upgrade to a larger vessel, Haidar is parting with the 64m boat just a year after its purchase. The superyacht does not presently have an advertised price, although it was last sold for $10,000,000 (approximately £8,186,300). 

By Catherine Ostler

By Francesca Ogiermann-White

By Ben Jureidini

Currently named Bash , the vessel has previously been called Jonikal , then Sokar. According to House and Garden , the yacht was designed by naval architect Vincenzo Ruggiero in the 1980s and built by the superyacht building firm Codecasa before launching in 1990. Lined with wood panelling and coffered ceilings, the interiors are suggestive of the Arts and Crafts style of the fin de siècle. With features such as a jacuzzi, swim platform, a formal dining room, main saloon, a bar, and office space, the boat is far from lacking in luxury spaces.

Fayed and Diana first met at a polo match in Windsor in 1986, while the royal was still married to Prince Charles. A year following Diana's divorce, the couple enjoyed a fleeting and jet-set romance, spending time in the South of France and Sardinia before they flew to Paris in August 1997. It was during their visit to the French capital that the pair were both devastatingly killed in a traffic collision, following their brief stay at the Hôtel Ritz. 

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