On his Philatélie au quotidien blog, Pierre Jullien, French journalist from Le Monde and Timbres magazine, told the story of the first day cancellation of the Scattered islands (see precedents episodes on my blog). An illustrated version is printed in Timbres magazine of July-August 2007, page 31.
Like I supposed, the Tromelin covers made a one-day trip by plane (in a Transall) with Philatelic Chief of the TAAF, Jean-Marie Jaguenaud. He cancelled around 2000 covers during four hours. 2500 minisheets of five stamps were sold in Paris and Saint-Denis in Réunion island (headquarters of the TAAF) during the pre-issues in May. 70 000 minisheets were printing and are sold.
My covers don't wear a big commemorative mark, black in Paris and blue in Réunion.
For those of you who are interesting in French TAAF postal marks, Timbres magazine gives page 16 the adress of the TAAF post offices.* After you buy TAAF stamps, prepare your covers and send them to the post agent with your will (FDC are available approximatively one month after stamp's issue, etc.). TAAF postal rates are easily foundable on their website (be careful, like all French overseas postal rates, their are different from Metropitan rates). You can send your questions to the philatelic service of the TAAF : philatelie@taaf.fr . If you read French : Philatelie des TAAF website may help.
* : I can't copy them all. The base is always the same :
Monsieur le Gérant postal
Name of the place : one of the Scattered islands or one of the TAAF bases
Name of the district
TERRES AUSTRALES ET ANTARCTIQUES FRANCAISES
VIA LA REUNION
no postcode required
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