Biography

 

Admitted to Polytechnique at the age of 18, he chose the Ponts et Chaussées engineering corps.For his first post, he was sent to Troyes, where he built the backstreet sewage system.At the same time, his interests were moving in the direction of both reinforced concrete and aeronautics.In 1912, he left public service and join forces with Armand Considère, with whom he designed several structures and pursued his research.

World War I temporarily interrupted his work on concrete, since he was recruited as a captain in a balloon company.To replace spherical balloons, which were too vulnerable to the wind, he invented an elongated, sausage-shaped balloon or blimp, and also developed winch systems to anchor them to the ground.These inventions, which he gifted to the Allied armies, brought him recognition and several decorations.In addition, Clemenceau appointed him technical director of military aviation in 1918. After the war, he returned to his construction career in the firm Pelnard-Considère et Caquot, where he designed multiple inventions:general theory of concrete granulation, development of reinforced concrete caissons, creation of the notion of the “intrinsic curve” to define the elasticity limits of materials, the fundamental theory of adaptation (1930).

Numerous structures were built using his designs:concrete bridges (Pont des Usses in Haute-Savoie and Pont Lafayette à Paris, in 1928, George V bridge in Glasgow...), dams (Sélune, Vezins (1929-1932), Mantasoa in Madagascar in 1937...), the internal structure of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro in 1928-1930, aviation hangars with wide roofs spans (Fréjus in 1935), a steamship jetty at Verdon in the mouth of the Gironde in 1934, the formwork for the horizontal drydock in Saint-Nazaire in 1935 etc.

In 1922, he became a professor at Ecole des mines then at École des Ponts et Chaussées where he taught the course on Reinforced Concrete (1934-1936), then the course on the Resistance of Materials (1936-1951).

In 1934, the French Academy of Sciences admitted him to its mechanics section and in 1938 he became Chairman of the French Society of Civil Engineers.That year, he was called upon to head all the national aviation companies, in order to standardise and increase their production.Quick results were required and war broke out before he could complete his task.He resigned in 1940 and returned finally to construction.

In 1947 the Ecole Polytechnique celebrated his scientific jubilee.In 1948, he headed the French Infrastructure Energy Committee and crusaded on behalf of hydroelectricity, a purely national energy.In 1952, he became President of the Academy of Sciences.His reputation, and the passion that he invested in everything he did, brought him the chairmanship of several bodies, in particular the International Standards Organisation (ISO), the French Standards Organisation (AFNOR), the Society for the Encouragement of National industry, the Federation of French Engineering Organisations and Enterprises, the National Council of French Engineers, the General Research and Scientific Organisation Committee (CEGOS), the French Committee on Soil Mechanics, the Scientific Prestress Organisation.He was also a member of the Economic Council and a non-executive director of EDF, as well as the recipient of honorary doctorates from many foreign universities.

He dedicated the last part of his life to the study of economic, energy and technical questions, such as the design for the Rance tidal power plant(1961-1966) or his 1967 proposal for a bridge over the English Channel.

In 2001, a stamp was issued marking the 120th anniversary of his birth and the 25th anniversary of his death.

Since 1989, the annual Albert Caquot Prize has been awarded by the French Association of Civil Engineers for an engineer’s lifetime achievement, in particular technical and scientific work, but also for his or her moral qualities and influence on the world of construction.

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