British Hovercraft Corporation (BHC) was a British hovercraft manufacturer that designed and produced multiple types of vehicles for both commercial and civil purposes.
181-601: Created with the intention of producing viable commercial hovercraft in March 1966, BHC was the result of a corporate merger between the Saunders-Roe division of Westland Aircraft and Vickers Supermarine 's hovercraft interests. None of the Vickers hovercraft designs reached quantity production, manufacturing efforts being centered upon Saunders-Roe's existing portfolio. Perhaps the most high-profile vehicle produced by BHC
362-482: A Royal Navy officer, C.H. Latimer-Needham , who sold his idea to Westland (by then the parent of Saunders-Roe's helicopter and hovercraft interests), and who worked with Cockerell to develop the idea further. The first passenger-carrying hovercraft to enter service was the Vickers VA-3 , which, in the summer of 1962, carried passengers regularly along the north Wales coast from Moreton, Merseyside, to Rhyl . It
543-563: A British invention in the 1950s. They are now used throughout the world as specialised transports in disaster relief, coastguard, military and survey applications, as well as for sport or passenger service. Very large versions have been used to transport hundreds of people and vehicles across the English Channel , whilst others have military applications used to transport tanks, soldiers and large equipment in hostile environments and terrain. Decline in public demand meant that as of 2023 ,
724-487: A First World nation by the 1990s; President Carlos Andrés Pérez of Venezuela likewise launched his Le Gran Venezuela project intended to make Venezuela into a First World nation; and President Yakubu Gowon of Nigeria told his people that henceforward Nigeria's main problem would be "managing abundance". After the oil shock, Nigeria presented itself as the first African nation that would reach First World status and in Lagos
905-480: A Navy-orientated version. In 1970, Westland Aircraft acquired the shares of the other parties, resulting in the BHC becoming a wholly owned subsidiary of Westland. In 1971, Westland successfully acquired the competing British rival Cushioncraft from Britten-Norman . During 1977, the BHC created the largest Union Flag in the world. It was painted on the doors of their hangar on the seafront at East Cowes to celebrate
1086-788: A Saudi leader since 1953 as he met King Faisal to ask him to end the embargo. Within two week of the embargo being launched, all of the foreign ministers of the nations of the European Economic Community (now the European Union) met in a conference to issue a statement calling for Israel "to end the territorial occupation which has maintained since the conflict of 1967". On December 11, 1973, the Japanese Foreign Minister Masayoshi Ōhira flew in to Riyadh to meet King Faisal for "talks on improving bilateral relations". Shortly afterwards,
1267-493: A capacity of 418 passengers and 60 cars. These were later joined by the French-built SEDAM N500 Naviplane with a capacity of 385 passengers and 45 cars; only one entered service and was used intermittently for a few years on the cross-channel service until returned to SNCF in 1983. The service ceased on 1 October 2000 after 32 years, due to competition with traditional ferries, catamarans ,
1448-511: A committee to review the Eisenhower-era quota program. Shultz's committee recommended that the quotas be abolished and replaced with tariffs but Nixon decided to keep the quotas due to vigorous political opposition. Nixon imposed a price ceiling on oil in 1971 as demand for oil was increasing and production was declining, which increased dependence on foreign oil imports as consumption was bolstered by low prices. In 1973, Nixon announced
1629-651: A conference in Vienna when it was announced the price for a barrel of oil was to from $ 5 US dollars per barrel to $ 11.65 US dollars per barrel. Faisal was opposed to the price increase, which was largely the work of the Iranian delegation. Over the long term, the oil embargo changed the nature of policy in the West towards increased exploration, alternative energy research, energy conservation and more restrictive monetary policy to better fight inflation. For further details see
1810-466: A design that relied only on the momentum of the air to provide lift, like a helicopter . In terms of power, a hovercraft would only need between one quarter to one half of the power required by a helicopter. Cockerell built and tested several models of his hovercraft design in Somerleyton, Suffolk, during the early 1950s. The design featured an engine mounted to blow from the front of the craft into
1991-775: A fast torpedo boat , the Versuchsgleitboot had a top speed of over 32 knots (59 km/h). It was thoroughly tested and even armed with torpedoes and machine guns for operation in the Adriatic . It never saw actual combat, however, and as the war progressed it was eventually scrapped due to a lack of interest and perceived need, and its engines returned to the air force. The theoretical grounds for motion over an air layer were constructed by Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovskii in 1926 and 1927. In 1929, Andrew Kucher of Ford began experimenting with
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#17327811722612172-519: A few months. Most scholars agree that the 1967 embargo was ineffective. Although some members of the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) supported the use of oil as a weapon to influence the political outcome of the Arab–Israeli conflict , Saudi Arabia had traditionally been the strongest supporter of separating oil from politics. The Saudis were wary of the tactic due to
2353-727: A fixed amount of gold. After 1971, OPEC was slow to readjust prices to reflect this depreciation. From 1947 to 1967, the dollar price of oil had risen by less than two percent per year. Until the oil shock, the price had also remained fairly stable versus other currencies and commodities. OPEC ministers had not developed institutional mechanisms to update prices in sync with changing market conditions, so their real incomes lagged. The substantial price increases of 1973–1974 largely returned their prices and corresponding incomes to former levels in terms of commodities such as gold. Arab oil producing countries had attempted to use oil as leverage to influence political events on two prior occasions—the first
2534-690: A global leader, courted by elites in both the First World and the Third World. The oil embargo led a sudden interest in the Palestinian issue. Between 1973 and 1981, Saudi Arabia donated a sum worth $ 1 billion US dollars to the Palestine Liberation Organization , which thus had a budget that exceeded that of many Third World nations. On November 8, 1973, Kissinger became the first Secretary of State to meet with
2715-612: A global recession and increased tension between the United States and several of its European allies, who faulted the US for provoking an embargo by providing what many viewed as unconditional assistance to Israel. OAPEC demanded a complete Israeli withdrawal from all territories beyond the 1949 Armistice border . The embargo lasted from October 1973 to March 1974. During a summit in Cairo on November 6, Kissinger asked Sadat what Faisal
2896-526: A new form of high-speed land transportation, probably in the field of rail surface travel, for fast trips of distances of up to about 1,600 kilometres (1,000 mi)". In 1959, Ford displayed a hovercraft concept car , the Ford Levacar Mach I . In August 1961, Popular Science reported on the Aeromobile 35B, an air-cushion vehicle (ACV) that was invented by William R. Bertelsen and
3077-471: A number of niche roles where its combination of features were advantageous. Today, they are found primarily in military use for amphibious operations, search-and-rescue vehicles in shallow water, and sporting vehicles. Hovercraft can be powered by one or more engines. Smaller craft, such as the SR.N6 , usually have one engine with the drive split through a gearbox. On vehicles with several engines, one usually drives
3258-604: A number of smaller cylindrical skirts instead of one large one in order to avoid the problems noted above. During the early 1960s he developed a series of prototype designs, which he called "terraplanes" if they were aimed for land use, and "naviplanes" for water. The best known of these designs was the N500 Naviplane , built for Seaspeed by the Société d'Etude et de Développement des Aéroglisseurs Marins (SEDAM). The N500 could carry 400 passengers, 55 cars and five buses. It set
3439-566: A plan to invade Abu Dhabi , Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia. Kissinger publicly threatened "countermeasures" in a Nov 21st, 1973 press conference if the embargo was not lifted, and the Saudis responded with threatening further oil cuts and to burn their oil fields if the US military invaded. After the CIA confirmed these threats, Kissinger gave up military intervention and decided that dealing with Israel's troop withdrawals and settled on diplomatic solutions to
3620-660: A plane; and the Army were 'plain not interested'." This lack of military interest meant that there was no reason to keep the concept secret, and it was declassified. Cockerell was finally able to convince the National Research Development Corporation to fund development of a full-scale model. In 1958, the NRDC placed a contract with Saunders-Roe for the development of what would become the SR.N1 , short for "Saunders-Roe, Nautical 1". The SR.N1
3801-488: A section of a large aerofoil (this creates a low-pressure area above the wing much like an aircraft), the craft was propelled by four aero engines driving two submerged marine propellers, with a fifth engine that blew air under the front of the craft to increase the air pressure under it. Only when in motion could the craft trap air under the front, increasing lift. The vessel also required a depth of water to operate and could not transition to land or other surfaces. Designed as
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#17327811722613982-493: A series of stately modernist buildings were erected as appropriate for a nation that saw itself as the leader of all black Africa. Much of the oil wealth in Nigeria was stolen by corrupt politicians. However, at least some of Nigeria's new oil wealth went to rebuild the areas devastated by the civil war of 1967-1970 and to address the complaints that too much of Nigeria's oil wealth went to the federal government in Lagos instead of
4163-613: A service to Calais from Dover, which was soon superseded by that of Seaspeed . As well as Saunders-Roe and Vickers (which combined in 1966 to form the British Hovercraft Corporation (BHC)), other commercial craft were developed during the 1960s in the UK by Cushioncraft (part of the Britten-Norman Group) and Hovermarine based at Woolston (the latter being sidewall hovercraft , where the sides of
4344-457: A sign of the pro-Israeli slant of American foreign policy. Faisal also felt insulted that Nixon had just promised Saqqaf a "honorable" peace the day before he submitted the request to Congress for some $ 2.2 billion worth of arms for Israel, which he saw as an act of duplicity on Nixon's part. Faisal had been opposed to a total embargo and only agreed to the 5% cut on October 17 under pressure from other Arab states. Faisal felt his efforts on behalf
4525-554: A single one of its stated objectives. The ceasefire which the USA and the USSR together imposed two days later upon Israel, Syria and Egypt would have been imposed in any case; Israel ended the October war, thanks to US aid, better equipped militarily than she had ever been before, and Faisal's ambition to shrink Israel back inside her pre-1949 boundaries remains unfulfilled to this day. Nor did
4706-458: A space below it, combining both lift and propulsion. He demonstrated the model flying over many Whitehall carpets in front of various government experts and ministers, and the design was subsequently put on the secret list. In spite of tireless efforts to arrange funding, no branch of the military was interested, as he later joked, "The Navy said it was a plane not a boat; the RAF said it was a boat not
4887-470: A speed record between Boulogne and Dover of 74 kn (137 km/h). It was rejected by its operators, who claimed that it was unreliable. Another discovery was that the total amount of air needed to lift the craft was a function of the roughness of the surface over which it travelled. On flat surfaces, like pavement, the required air pressure was so low that hovercraft were able to compete in energy terms with conventional systems like steel wheels. However,
5068-409: A suggestion made by his business partner Arthur Ord-Hume. In 1958, he suggested the use of two rings of rubber to produce a double-walled extension of the vents in the lower fuselage. When air was blown into the space between the sheets it exited the bottom of the skirt in the same way it formerly exited the bottom of the fuselage, re-creating the same momentum curtain, but this time at some distance from
5249-698: A walled air cushion vehicle, the Glidemobile . Because the project was classified by the U.S. government, Fletcher could not file a patent. In April 1958, Ford engineers demonstrated the Glide-air, a one-metre (three-foot) model of a wheel-less vehicle that speeds on a thin film of air only 76.2 μm ( 3 ⁄ 1000 of an inch) above its tabletop roadbed. An article in Modern Mechanix quoted Andrew A. Kucher, Ford's vice president in charge of Engineering and Research noting "We look upon Glide-air as
5430-565: Is used as a high-speed ferry for up to 47 passengers and 47,500 pounds (21,500 kg) of freight serving the remote Alaskan villages of King Cove and Cold Bay . An experimental service was operated in Scotland across the Firth of Forth (between Kirkcaldy and Portobello, Edinburgh ), from 16 to 28 July 2007. Marketed as Forthfast , the service used a craft chartered from Hovertravel and achieved an 85% passenger load factor . As of 2009 ,
5611-480: The "drain America first" policy. Some scholars believe the policy contributed to the decline of domestic US oil production in the early 1970s. The cheapness of oil compared with coal led to the decline of the coal industry. In 1951, 51% of America's energy came from coal, and by 1973, only 19% of America's industry was coal-based. When Richard Nixon became president in 1969, he assigned George Shultz to head
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5792-674: The 2007 UK floods . Since 2006, hovercraft have been used in aid in Madagascar by HoverAid, an international NGO who use the hovercraft to reach the most remote places on the island. The Scandinavian airline SAS used to charter an AP1-88 hovercraft for regular passengers between Copenhagen Airport , Denmark, and the SAS Hovercraft Terminal in Malmö , Sweden. In 1998, the US Postal Service began using
5973-465: The Aérotrain . These designs competed with maglev systems in the high-speed arena, where their primary advantage was the very "low tech" tracks they needed. On the downside, the air blowing dirt and trash out from under the trains presented a unique problem in stations, and interest in them waned in the 1970s. By the early 1970s, the basic concept had been well developed, and the hovercraft had found
6154-650: The Bar Lev Line in the Sinai Peninsula and Syria launched an offensive in the Golan Heights , both of which had been occupied by Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War . The war began during the height of the Watergate scandal and Nixon largely let Kissinger manage foreign policy as he was distracted by the scandal. On 8 October 1973, Faisal told two Egyptian envoys: "You have made us all proud. In
6335-461: The Levapad concept, metal disks with pressurized air blown through a hole in the centre. Levapads do not offer stability on their own. Several must be used together to support a load above them. Lacking a skirt, the pads had to remain very close to the running surface. He initially imagined these being used in place of casters and wheels in factories and warehouses, where the concrete floors offered
6516-418: The SR.N4 , a large cross- Channel ferry capable of seating up to 418 passengers along with 60 cars, and the SR.N5 , the first commercially active hovercraft. British Hovercraft Corporation (BHC) emerged as a corporate entity in March 1966, at which point the Saunders-Roe division of Westland Aircraft and Vickers Supermarine (the two largest hovercraft manufacturers in the world) were merged. Following
6697-540: The SR.N5 Warden class, the stretched SR.N6 Winchester class, and the large SR.N4 Mountbatten class hovercraft. Substantial support for the hovercraft industry, and BHC specifically, was sourced directly from the British Government. By 1969, contributions from the British state averaged around £3 million per year; of this, roughly one-third was attributed to research and development contracts, while
6878-562: The Silver Jubilee of Elizabeth II . In 1984, the company was renamed Westland Aerospace ; around this time, design work on new hovercraft effectively ceased. Instead, the company became increasingly involved with the manufacture of composites , which were widely used throughout the aerospace industry. Later, after GKN had taken over the Westlands Group in 1994, the firm was renamed GKN Aerospace. Inherited designs from
7059-401: The "Energy crisis" series by Facts on File. The effects of the embargo were immediate. OPEC forced oil companies to increase payments drastically. The price of oil quadrupled by 1974 from US$ 3 to nearly US$ 12 per 42 gallon barrel ($ 75 per cubic meter), equivalent in 2018 dollars to a price rise from $ 17 to $ 61 per barrel. Saudi Arabia had 25% of the world's oil, but only 4% of the oil used in
7240-535: The "oil weapon". It came in the form of an embargo and production cutbacks from the Arab states. The weapon was aimed at the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Japan and the Netherlands. These target governments perceived that the intent was to push them towards a more pro-Arab position. Production was eventually cut by 25%. However, the affected countries did not undertake dramatic policy changes. The risk that
7421-508: The "peace of the brave" (i.e. a victorious leader being magnanimous to his defeated opponents) meant there was a possibility that Sadat at least would make peace with Israel provided that the war ended in such a way that Egypt was not perceived to be defeated. Likewise, Kissinger regarded Meir as being rather arrogant and believed that an armistice that ended the war in a manner that was not an unambiguous Israeli victory would make her more humble. As both Syria and Egypt lost much equipment during
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7602-421: The $ 850 million worth of arms requested sent a request to Congress for some $ 2.2 billion worth of arms to Israel, which was promptly approved. Nixon, whose administration was being badly battered by the Watergate scandal, felt that a bold foreign policy move might resuscitate his administration. Nixon later boasted in his memoirs that the U.S. Air Force flew more sorties to Israel in October 1973 than it had during
7783-610: The 1973 Yom Kippur War , which began after Egypt and Syria launched a large-scale surprise attack in an ultimately unsuccessful attempt to recover the territories that they had lost to Israel during the 1967 Six-Day War . In an effort that was led by Faisal of Saudi Arabia , the initial countries that OAPEC targeted were Canada , Japan , the Netherlands , the United Kingdom , and the United States . This list
7964-702: The 1973 "oil price shock" and the accompanying 1973–74 stock market crash as the first discrete event since the Great Depression to have a persistent effect on the US economy. The embargo had a negative influence on the US economy by causing immediate demands to address the threats to U.S. energy security. On an international level, the price increases changed competitive positions in many industries, such as automobiles. Macroeconomic problems consisted of both inflationary and deflationary impacts. The embargo left oil companies searching for new ways to increase oil supplies, even in rugged terrain such as
8145-724: The Algerian state to end many of its more generous social policies between 1986 and 1988, leading to an unemployment rate of 30% by 1988 along with the knowledge that the FLN regime had stolen millions. In the aftermath of the October riots, President Chadli Bendjedid began a transition to democracy. The first free elections in Algeria in January 1992 were won by the Islamist FIS, which led to a military coup and an outbreak of civil war that
8326-558: The American nuclear industry as a way to achieve "energy independence" from the Middle East. On 7 November 1973, Nixon in an address to Congress called for Project Independence to make the United States self-sufficient in energy by 1980, which called for a massive investment in the nuclear industry. Nixon seems to have assumed that nuclear energy was economical, and was encouraged by the faddish enthusiasm of many officials who more on
8507-427: The American oil imports came from the Middle East. Throughout the 1960s, the price for a barrel of oil remained at $ 1.80, meaning that with the effects of inflation considered the price of oil in real terms got progressively lower and lower throughout the decade with Americans paying less for oil in 1969 than they had in 1959. Even after a price for a barrel of oil rose to $ 2.00 in 1971, adjusted for inflation, people in
8688-464: The Americans simply imported more oil from nations that were not part of the embargo such as Iran, but the 400% increase in the price of oil caused by the embargo did damage the American economy. A number of nations such as Venezuela, Nigeria, Iran and Iraq increased their oil production during the embargo, but just sold their oil at a higher price. The leader who pushed the most for higher oil prices
8869-497: The Arab oil embargo of 1973–74 that for people in the West life suddenly become "slower, darker and chiller" as gasoline was rationed, the lights were turned off in Times Square, the "gas guzzler" automobiles suddenly stopped selling, speed limits became common and restrictions were placed on weekend driving in a bid to conserve fuel. As the American automobile industry specialized in producing heavy "gas guzzler" vehicles, there
9050-855: The Arctic. Finding oil and developing new fields usually required five to 10 years before significant production. The average US retail price of a gallon of regular gasoline rose 43% from 38.5¢ in May 1973 to 55.1¢ in June 1974. State governments asked citizens not to put up Christmas lights. Oregon banned Christmas and commercial lighting altogether. Politicians called for a national gasoline rationing program. Nixon asked gasoline retailers to voluntarily not sell gasoline on Saturday nights or Sundays; 90% of gas station owners complied, which produced long lines of motorists wanting to fill up their cars while they still could. The "oil shock" provided considerable impetus to
9231-545: The Berlin Airlift of 1948–49, flying in a gargantuan quantity of arms, though he also admitted that by the time the arms lift had begun, the Israelis had already "turned the tide of battle" in their favor, making the arms lift irrelevant to the outcome of the war. In an interview with the British historian Robert Lacey in 1981, Kissinger later admitted about the arms lift to Israel: "I made a mistake. In retrospect it
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#17327811722619412-534: The British built Hoverwork AP1-88 to haul mail, freight, and passengers from Bethel, Alaska , to and from eight small villages along the Kuskokwim River . Bethel is far removed from the Alaska road system, thus making the hovercraft an attractive alternative to the air based delivery methods used prior to introduction of the hovercraft service. Hovercraft service is suspended for several weeks each year while
9593-406: The British government would be ultimately be fulfilled. As early as 1964, Saunders-Roe had been engaged in studies of very large hovercraft, including a prospective 2,000 ton freighter-orientated vehicle, in addition to its ongoing interest in the development of smaller-scale hovercraft. Work on giant ocean-going hovercraft continued under the BHC, but ultimately did not lead to any vehicle larger than
9774-554: The English Channel. Hoverlloyd operated from Ramsgate , where a special hoverport had been built at Pegwell Bay, to Calais. Seaspeed operated from Dover, England, to Calais and Boulogne in France. The first SR.N4 had a capacity of 254 passengers and 30 cars, and a top speed of 83 kn (154 km/h). The channel crossing took around 30 minutes and was run like an airline with flight numbers. The later SR.N4 Mk.III had
9955-645: The French foreign minister Michel Jobert arrived to sign an agreement that provided oil for France for the next twenty years. On January 24, 1974, as the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi , was coming off the ski slopes of St. Moritz , he was met by the British Chancellor of Exchequer, Anthony Barber , and the Trade Secretary, Peter Walker . In a role-reversal, Barber and Walker paid homage to
10136-549: The Grand Mosque and the surviving "renegades" as the rebels were labelled were executed. Likewise, the perception that that most of the wealth being generated by the now higher price of oil was being stolen by a corrupt Shah along with the unfulfilled promises of the "Great Civilization" project played a major role in causing the Iranian Revolution of 197–1979 that toppled the Shah and led to the establishment of
10317-435: The Iranian delegation left Kuwait City as the Shah of Iran was only interested in higher oil prices. The Oil Minister of Iraq, Sa'dun Hammadi demanded the "total nationalization" of all assets of American oil companies in the Middle East, the withdrawal of all Arab funds from the United States and for all Arab states to break diplomatic relations with the United States. The Libyan Oil Minister, Izz al-Din al-Mabruk, called for
10498-786: The Iraqi and Libyan demands for an embargo as Yemani maintained that forcing through an increase in the price of oil was the best way to influence the United States. Hammadi and the rest of the Iraqi delegation left in a huff as Yemani had won over the majority of the delegations to the Saudi viewpoint. The statement issued after midnight at the Sheraton Hotel was handwritten and reflecting the tense talk had several paragraphs crossed out while other paragraphs were written in by different hands. On October 17, Arab oil producers cut production by 5% and instituted an oil embargo against Israel's allies:
10679-551: The Islamic Republic of Iran in February 1979. In Algeria, the "oil shock" led to the establishment of a welfare state where none had existed previously. The lower oil prices of the 1980s along with cutbacks and the belief that the FLN regime was corrupt helped cause the riots of October 1988 against the FLN regime that killed at least 500 people. The riots were largely caused by the fact that the low oil prices had forced
10860-446: The Middle East could become another superpower confrontation with the USSR was of more concern to Washington than oil. Further, interest groups and government agencies more worried about energy were no match for Kissinger's dominance. In the US production, distribution and price disruptions "have been held responsible for recessions, periods of excessive inflation, reduced productivity, and lower economic growth." Some researchers regard
11041-412: The Middle East. In the early 1960s Libya , Indonesia and Qatar joined OPEC. OPEC was generally regarded as ineffective until political turbulence in Libya and Iraq strengthened their position in 1970. Additionally, increasing Soviet influence provided oil producing countries with alternative means of transporting oil to markets. Under the Tehran Price Agreement of 1971 , signed on February 14,
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#173278117226111222-548: The October War more in terms of the Cold War rather than Middle Eastern politics, both seeing the Soviet arms lifts to Egypt and Syria as a Soviet power play that required an American answer. On October 12, 1973, US president Richard Nixon authorized Operation Nickel Grass , a strategic airlift to deliver weapons and supplies to Israel in order to replace its materiel losses, after the Soviet Union began sending arms to Syria and Egypt. The first American weapons to Israel arrived only on 15 October 1973, and despite Nixon's orders
11403-435: The Red Sea port of Jeddah , there were so many ships queuing up laden with cement for the construction boom in Saudi Arabia that construction contractors hired helicopters to fly the cement in, twenty bags per flight. A number of families engaged in the Saudi construction industry such as the Juffali, Alireza, al-Khasshoggi and the bin Laden families all become very wealthy as a result of the construction boom. The period after
11584-426: The SR.N1 Mk II. A further upgrade with the Armstrong Siddeley Viper produced the Mk III. Further modifications, especially the addition of pointed nose and stern areas, produced the Mk IV. Although the SR.N1 was successful as a testbed, the design hovered too close to the surface to be practical; at 9 inches (23 cm) even small waves would hit the bow. The solution was offered by Cecil Latimer-Needham , following
11765-531: The SR.N4 being produced. During 1968, the British government decided to withdraw its backing for the company's feasibility study on large hovercraft, resulting in the BHC's development programme being curtailed. As a result of high oil prices following the 1973 oil crisis and the 1979 energy crisis , the profitability of the first generation of commercial hovercraft was badly hit, undermining operators' profitability and provoking requests from customers for more fuel efficient vehicles. Furthermore, hovercraft were not
11946-445: The Saunders Roe division of Westland Aircraft: Other: Hovercraft A hovercraft ( pl. : hovercraft ), also known as an air-cushion vehicle or ACV , is an amphibious craft capable of travelling over land, water, mud, ice, and various other surfaces. Hovercraft use blowers to produce a large volume of air below the hull , or air cushion, that is slightly above atmospheric pressure . The pressure difference between
12127-409: The Second Arab–Israeli war, was sparked by Israel's southern port of Eilat being blocked by Egypt , which also nationalized the Suez Canal belonging to French and British investors. As a result of the war, the Suez Canal was closed for several months between 1956 and 1957 . The Six-Day War of 1967 included an Israeli invasion of the Egyptian Sinai Peninsula , which resulted in Egypt closing
12308-417: The Shah, who promised them that his nation would sell the United Kingdom 5 million tons of oil in exchange for some £100 million of British goods to aid his plans to industrialize Iran. Saudi Arabia experienced an upsurge of prosperity and affluence after the oil embargo whose consequences horrified King Faisal. Faisal who was devoted to a harsh puritanical strain of Sunni Islam known in the West as Wahhabism
12489-436: The Soviet military personnel in Egypt in a signal that he wanted better relations with the United States. Kissinger was taken completely by surprise by Sadat's move, saying: "Why has he done me this favor? Why didn't he demand all sorts of concessions first?" Sadat expected as a reward that the United States would respond by pressuring Israel to return the Sinai to Egypt, but after his anti-Soviet move prompted no response from
12670-454: The Suez Canal for eight years . Following the Yom Kippur War , the canal was cleared in 1974 and opened again in 1975. OAPEC countries cut production of oil and placed an embargo on oil exports to the United States after Richard Nixon requested $ 2.2 billion to support Israel's war effort. Nevertheless, the embargo lasted only until January 1974, though the price of oil remained high afterwards. By 1969, American domestic output of oil
12851-401: The Suez War. If the United States had done the same after 1967, we would not have witnessed the this deterioration... Before the Jewish State was established, there existed nothing to harm good relations between Arabs and Jews. There were many Jews in Arab countries. When the Jews were persecuted in Spain, Arabs protected them. When the Romans drove the Jews out, Arabs protected them. At Yalta, it
13032-563: The US/Canadian Great Lakes operate hovercraft for water and ice rescues, often of ice fisherman stranded when ice breaks off from shore. The Canadian Coast Guard uses hovercraft to break light ice. In October 2008, The Red Cross commenced a flood-rescue service hovercraft based in Inverness , Scotland. Gloucestershire Fire and Rescue Service received two flood-rescue hovercraft donated by Severn Trent Water following
13213-452: The United States forced prices to raise, which in turn led prices to rise everywhere all over the world as oil producers that had not joined the embargo such as Iran, Venezuela, Libya and Iraq demanded higher prices in Japan and Europe as an initiative to ship oil to those places instead of the United States, thus settling off a worldwide inflationary spiral. The only European nations subject to
13394-419: The United States in 1973 came from the kingdom. However, Saudi Arabia plays an over-sized role within the Arab world, and as a Beirut oil consultant noted in 1974: "If Saudi Arabia moves from A to B, then every other oil producer must move at least as far, if not to C." In 1973, about 25% of the oil used in the United States came from Arab countries. The mere shortage of oil caused by the Arab oil embargo within
13575-576: The United States were not being appreciated in Washington, which increased his fury at Nixon. Saudi Arabia only consented to the embargo after Nixon's promise of $ 2.2 billion in military aid to Israel. On the afternoon of October 19, 1973, Faisal was in his office when he learned about the United States sending $ 2.2 billion worth of weapons to Israel, and discussed the issue with two of his closest advisers, Abdullah ibn Abdul Rahman and Rashad Pharaon. The king called Yamani at about 8 pm, and told him he
13756-657: The United States, by November 1972 Sadat moved again closer to the Soviet Union, buying a massive amount of Soviet arms for a war he planned to launch against Israel in 1973. For Sadat, cost was no object as the money to buy Soviet arms came from Saudi Arabia. At the same time, Faisal promised Sadat that if it should come to war, Saudi Arabia would embargo oil to the West. In April 1973, the Saudi Oil Minister Ahmed Zaki Yamani visited Washington to meet Kissinger and told him that King Faisal
13937-488: The United States, the Netherlands, Rhodesia , South Africa, and Portugal. On October 17–19, 1973, the Saudi Foreign Minister, Omar Al Saqqaf , visited Washington together with the foreign ministers of Algeria, Kuwait and Morocco to warn that there was a real possibility of an oil embargo being imposed. Saqqaf complained to King Faisal that Nixon seemed more interested in a dispute about "a burglary" (i.e.
14118-528: The Watergate scandal) than about the October War. During a press conference, an American reporter mocked the threat, contemptuously saying the Saudis "could drink their oil", leading Saqqaf to reply in anger "All right, we will!". Joined by the foreign ministers of Algeria, Kuwait and Morocco, Saqqaf met with Nixon in the Oval Office who promised him that the United States would mediate a settlement to
14299-518: The Western nations were paying less for oil in 1971 than they had in 1958. The extremely low price of oil served as the basis for the " long summer " of prosperity and mass affluence that began in 1945. The Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), was founded by five oil producing countries at a Baghdad conference on September 14, 1960. The five founding members of OPEC were Venezuela , Iraq , Saudi Arabia , Iran and Kuwait . OPEC
14480-595: The aegis of P & A Campbell, the paddle steamer operators. Operations by Hovertravel commenced on 24 July 1965, using the SR.N6, which carried 38 passengers. Two 98 seat AP1-88 hovercraft were introduced on this route in 1983, and in 2007, these were joined by the first 130-seat BHT130 craft. The AP1-88 and the BHT130 were notable as they were largely built by Hoverwork using shipbuilding techniques and materials (i.e. welded aluminium structure and diesel engines) rather than
14661-506: The aircraft techniques used to build the earlier craft built by Saunders-Roe-British Hovercraft Corporation. Over 20 million passengers had used the service as of 2004 – the service is still operating (as of 2020 ) and is by far the longest, continuously-operated hovercraft service. In 1966, two cross-channel passenger hovercraft services were inaugurated using SR.N6 hovercraft. Hoverlloyd ran services from Ramsgate Harbour, England, to Calais , France, and Townsend Ferries also started
14842-559: The availability of oil from non-Arab oil producing countries, and in the decades leading up to the crisis, the region's conservative monarchies had grown dependent on Western support to ensure their continued survival as Nasserism gained traction. On the other hand, Algeria, Iraq and Libya had strongly supported the use of oil as a weapon in the conflict. Arab newspapers like the Egyptian Al-Ahram , Lebanese An-Nahar and Iraqi Al-Thawra had historically been supportive of
15023-481: The back to push the craft forward. The British aircraft and marine engineering company Saunders-Roe built the first practical human-carrying hovercraft for the National Research Development Corporation , the SR.N1, which carried out several test programmes in 1959 to 1961 (the first public demonstration was in 1959), including a cross-channel test run in July 1959, piloted by Peter "Sheepy" Lamb, an ex-naval test pilot and
15204-510: The basis of faith than rationality saw nuclear energy as the technology of the future. By the late 1960s, a lively environmentalist movement had emerged in the United States, and the Project Independence nuclear program was the subject of much debate in both the media and Congress. The ensuing debates revealed that many of the claims made for nuclear power vast underestimated the true costs of nuclear reactors. Equally problematic
15385-400: The benefit of increasing payload capacity. It was also recognised that there were other means to drive down costs and thereby improve the hovercraft's commercial viability. These early vehicles had been powered by gas turbine engines , which were typically similar, or identical, to the turboshaft engines used on helicopters ; however, by the 1970s, recent advances in diesel engines had made
15566-475: The bottom of the craft. Latimer-Needham and Cockerell devised a 4-foot (1.2 m) high skirt design, which was fitted to the SR.N1 to produce the Mk V, displaying hugely improved performance, with the ability to climb over obstacles almost as high as the skirt. In October 1961, Latimer-Needham sold his skirt patents to Westland , who had recently taken over Saunders Roe's interest in the hovercraft. Experiments with
15747-403: The case for nuclear power in the ensuring debates. By 1989, only 18% of American energy came from nuclear power plants, which was a faction of what Project Independence had envisioned in 1973. The "oil shock" led to anti-Arab feelings becoming common. Cartoons published in American newspapers during the "oil shock" depicted Arabs as disgusting, ugly, obese, corrupt and greedy. In the cartoons,
15928-472: The chief test pilot at Saunders Roe. Christopher Cockerell was on board, and the flight took place on the 50th anniversary of Louis Blériot 's first aerial crossing. The SR.N1 was driven by expelled air, powered by a single piston engine. Demonstrated at the Farnborough Airshow in 1960, it was shown that this simple craft can carry a load of up to 12 marines with their equipment as well as
16109-522: The company was renamed Westland Aerospace . During the late 1950s and early 1960s, British inventor Sir Christopher Cockerell had, in cooperation with British aerospace manufacturer Saunders-Roe , developed a pioneering new form of transportation, embodied in the form of the experimental SR.N1 vehicle, which became widely known as the hovercraft . British manufacturer Saunders-Roe proceeded with work on various hovercraft designs, successfully developing multiple commercially viable vehicles. These included
16290-453: The demand being made that the government find some other community to store the rods. Many of the nuclear reactors ordered in 1973 were cancelled due to the horrendous cost overruns while over 100 nuclear plants were shut down as uneconomical over the next 10 years. Unlike nations that tried to use nuclear power as a way for "energy independence" such as France and Sweden, the United States had substantial reserves of its own oil, which weakened
16471-607: The disappearance of duty-free shopping within the EU, the advancing age of the SR.N4 hovercraft, and the opening of the Channel Tunnel . The commercial success of hovercraft suffered from rapid rises in fuel prices during the late 1960s and 1970s, following conflict in the Middle East. Alternative over-water vehicles, such as wave-piercing catamarans (marketed as the SeaCat in the UK until 2005), use less fuel and can perform most of
16652-550: The dollar inconvertible to gold directly, except on the open market, and was soon dubbed the Nixon Shock , leading eventually to the collapse of the Bretton Woods system in 1976. Because oil was priced in dollars, oil producers' real income decreased when the dollar started to float free of the old link to gold. In September 1971, OPEC issued a joint communiqué stating that from then on, they would price oil in terms of
16833-504: The efficiency and viability of hovercraft; the AP1-88 was produced in quantity not only by BHC but also under licence in both Australia and China . In 1970, Westland Aircraft acquired the shares from the other firm's owners, making the BHC a wholly owned subsidiary of Westland. During the 1980s, the firm's focus on hovercraft declined as it became increasingly involved in the manufacture of composites for other company's products. In 1984,
17014-417: The embargo of 1973–1974 had caused about 500,000 Americans to lose their jobs and caused a GNP loss between $ 10 billion–$ 20 billion. This price increase had a dramatic effect on oil exporting nations, for the countries of the Middle East who had long been dominated by the industrial powers were seen to have taken control of a vital commodity. The oil-exporting nations began to accumulate vast wealth. Some of
17195-618: The embargo was a failure because the countries that were targeted by the embargo did not change their policies on the Arab–Israeli conflict. Licklieder believed that any long term changes were caused by the OPEC increase in the posted price of oil, and not the OAPEC embargo. Daniel Yergin , on the other hand, has said that the embargo "remade the international economy". Lacey wrote: "King Faisal's momentous oil embargo of 20 October 1973 did not achieve
17376-482: The embargo. The crisis eased when the embargo was lifted in March 1974 after negotiations at the Washington Oil Summit, but the effects lingered throughout the 1970s. The dollar price of energy increased again the following year, amid the weakening competitive position of the dollar in world markets. The Arab oil embargo ended the long period of prosperity in the West that had begun in 1945, throwing
17557-407: The end of the quota system. Between 1970 and 1973 US imports of crude oil had nearly doubled, reaching 6.2 million barrels per day in 1973. Until 1973, an abundance of oil supply had kept the market price of oil lower than the posted price. In 1970, American oil production peaked and the United States began to import more and more oil as oil imports rose by 52% between 1969 and 1972. By 1972, 83% of
17738-474: The extra thrust could be directed fore or aft, differentially for rotation. The SR.N1 made its first hover on 11 June 1959, and made its famed successful crossing of the English Channel on 25 July 1959. In December 1959, the Duke of Edinburgh visited Saunders-Roe at East Cowes and persuaded the chief test-pilot, Commander Peter Lamb, to allow him to take over the SR.N1's controls. He flew the SR.N1 so fast that he
17919-454: The fact that The Protocols had been exposed as a forgery in 1921. Initially, Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger suggested to Kissinger that the USA invade Saudi Arabia and another Arab countries and seize their oil fields. Kissinger stated in a private state department meeting that it's “ridiculous that the civilized world is held up by 8 million savages... Can’t we overthrow one of the sheikhs just to show that we can do it?” They formed
18100-413: The fan (or impeller ), which is responsible for lifting the vehicle by forcing high pressure air under the craft. The air inflates the "skirt" under the vehicle, causing it to rise above the surface. Additional engines provide thrust in order to propel the craft. Some hovercraft use ducting to allow one engine to perform both tasks by directing some of the air to the skirt, the rest of the air passing out of
18281-560: The fighting, the Soviet Union began to fly new equipment in starting on October 12, and the Soviet flights to Syria and Egypt were recorded by the British radar stations in Cyprus. Though the Soviets were flying in an average of 60 flights per day, exaggerated accounts appeared in Western newspapers speaking of "one hundred flights per day". At this point, both Nixon and Kissinger began to see
18462-470: The fighting. So we agreed to cut back production by just 5 percent per month. A full embargo, we agreed, was something we would implement only if we felt that things were absolutely hopeless". At an OPEC summit at the Sheraton Hotel in Kuwait City on October 16, 1973, it was announced the price of oil would go from $ 3.01 U.S. dollars per barrel to $ 5.12 per barrel. After agreeing to the price increase,
18643-601: The first Local Authority fire service in the UK to operate a hovercraft. It is used to rescue people from thick mud in the Weston-super-Mare area and during times of inland flooding. A Griffon rescue hovercraft has been in use for a number of years with the Airport Fire Service at Dundee Airport in Scotland. It is used in the event of an aircraft ditching in the Tay estuary. Numerous fire departments around
18824-468: The first to demonstrate a practical vehicle in continued use. A memorial to Cockerell's first design stands in the village of Somerleyton . Cockerell came across the key concept in his design when studying the ring of airflow when high-pressure air was blown into the annular area between two concentric tin cans (one coffee and the other from cat food) and a hairdryer. This produced a ring of airflow, as expected, but he noticed an unexpected benefit as well;
19005-530: The followers of the Mahdi (a messianic figure said to appear at the dawn of every Muslim century to strike down the enemies of Islam). The leader of the uprising, Juhayman al-Otaybi , read out a list of grievances as he accused the House of Saud of being corrupt and degenerate as he listed by name a number of Saudi princes who were engaged in dubious business dealings and/or who drank alcohol. The Saudi Army recaptured
19186-536: The global economy as well as on global politics. The 1973 embargo later came to be referred to as the "first oil shock" vis-à-vis the "second oil shock" that was the 1979 oil crisis , brought upon by the Iranian Revolution . Ever since Israel declared independence in 1948 there was conflict between Arabs and Israelis in the Middle East , including several wars . The Suez Crisis , also known as
19367-405: The higher-pressure air below the hull and lower pressure ambient air above it produces lift, which causes the hull to float above the running surface. For stability reasons, the air is typically blown through slots or holes around the outside of a disk- or oval-shaped platform, giving most hovercraft a characteristic rounded-rectangle shape. The first practical design for hovercraft was derived from
19548-444: The hovercraft became an effective transport system for high-speed service on water and land, leading to widespread developments for military vehicles, search and rescue, and commercial operations. By 1962, many UK aviation and shipbuilding firms were working on hovercraft designs, including Saunders Roe/ Westland , Vickers-Armstrong , William Denny , Britten-Norman and Folland . Small-scale ferry service started as early as 1962 with
19729-427: The hovercraft lift system acted as both a lift and a very effective suspension, and thus it naturally lent itself to high-speed use where conventional suspension systems were considered too complex. This led to a variety of " hovertrain " proposals during the 1960s, including England's Tracked Hovercraft and France's Aérotrain . In the U.S., Rohr Inc. and Garrett both took out licences to develop local versions of
19910-784: The hovercraft's marine tasks. Although developed elsewhere in the world for both civil and military purposes, except for the Solent Ryde-to-Southsea crossing, hovercraft disappeared from the coastline of Britain until a range of Griffon Hoverwork were bought by the Royal National Lifeboat Institution . Hovercraft used to ply between the Gateway of India in Mumbai and CBD Belapur and Vashi in Navi Mumbai between 1994 and 1999, but
20091-785: The hull projected down into the water to trap the cushion of air with normal hovercraft skirts at the bow and stern ). One of these models, the HM-2, was used by Red Funnel between Southampton (near the Woolston Floating Bridge ) and Cowes . The world's first car-carrying hovercraft was made in 1968, the BHC Mountbatten class (SR.N4) models, each powered by four Bristol Proteus turboshaft engines. These were both used by rival operators Hoverlloyd and Seaspeed (which joined to form Hoverspeed in 1981) to operate regular car and passenger carrying services across
20272-477: The income was dispensed in the form of aid to other underdeveloped nations whose economies had been caught between higher oil prices and lower prices for their own export commodities, amid shrinking Western demand. Much went for arms purchases that exacerbated political tensions, particularly in the Middle East. Saudi Arabia spent over 100 billion dollars in the ensuing decades for helping spread its fundamentalist interpretation of Islam, known as Wahhabism , throughout
20453-403: The king end the oil embargo after Sadat, whom he trusted, reported to him that the United States was being more "evenhanded" and after Kissinger had promised to sell Saudi Arabia weapons that it had previously denied under the grounds that they might be used against Israel. More importantly, Saudi Arabia had billions of dollars invested in Western banks, and the massive bout of inflation set off by
20634-440: The last commercial line had linked Ōita Airport and central Ōita but was shut down in October 2009. However, the commercial line between Ōita Airport and central Ōita is scheduled to reopen in 2024. 1973 oil crisis In October 1973, the Organization of Arab Petroleum Exporting Countries (OAPEC) announced that it was implementing a total oil embargo against countries that had supported Israel at any point during
20815-480: The launch of the Vickers-Armstrong VA-3. With the introduction of the 254 passenger and 30 car carrying SR.N4 cross-channel ferry by Hoverlloyd and Seaspeed in 1968, hovercraft had developed into useful commercial craft. Another major pioneering effort of the early hovercraft era was carried out by Jean Bertin 's firm in France. Bertin was an advocate of the "multi-skirt" approach, which used
20996-410: The long hooked Semitic noses that had traditionally been featured in anti-Jewish cartoons were applied to the Arab sheiks as a way to illustrate their supposed greed. American public opinion did not see the use of the "oil weapon" as due to politics, and tended to explain the embargo as only due to the excessive greed of King Faisal and the other Arab leaders, hence the use of the hooked Semitic nose in
21177-422: The loss of lift at that point, and this led to further pressure on the skirt. After considerable experimentation, Denys Bliss at Hovercraft Development Ltd. found the solution to this problem. Instead of using two separate rubber sheets to form the skirt, a single sheet of rubber was bent into a U shape to provide both sides, with slots cut into the bottom of the U forming the annular vent. When deforming pressure
21358-433: The merger, Westland Aircraft held 65% of the shares in BHC, while Vickers had a 25% stake in the venture and the British state-owned National Research Development Corporation also held 10% of the shares. Despite the inclusion of Vickers' hovercraft venture, none of its designs were ever taken through to the manufacturing stage; instead, production activity was centred on the existing designs produced by Saunders-Roe, including
21539-525: The modern features of a lift engine blowing air into a flexible envelope for lift. Kaario's efforts were followed closely in the Soviet Union by Vladimir Levkov, who returned to the solid-sided design of the Versuchsgleitboot . Levkov designed and built a number of similar craft during the 1930s, and his L-5 fast-attack boat reached 70 knots (130 km/h) in testing. However, the start of World War II put an end to his development work. During World War II, an American engineer, Charles Fletcher , invented
21720-579: The nationalization of all the assets of all Western oil companies in the Middle East. The news about the war on October 16 was grim from the Arab viewpoint with the Syrians steadily being pushed back while Israelis had opened a counter-offensive against the Egyptians and crossed the Great Bitter Lake. The Saudi delegation led by Yemani, supported by the Algerian delegation, fought hard against
21901-586: The number of American planes flying into Tel Aviv were initially limited. After the first week of the war, the Israelis had halted the Syrian offensive in the Golan Heights and were pushing back the Syrians back towards Damascus, but along the Suez canal, there was heavy fighting with the Egyptians holding their own. Yamani stated in a 1981 interview: "The king still wanted to give America a chance to stay out of
22082-498: The odds of making peace along the lines of United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 calling for a "land for peace" deal if an armistice was signed with Egypt and Syria gaining some territory in the Sinai and the Golan Heights respectively. Nixon had ordered an arms lift to Israel on 12 October 1973, but Kissinger used the excuse of bureaucratic delays to limit the amount of weapons and ammunition sent to Israel. The Arab concept of
22263-494: The oil embargo was a threat to this fortune as inflation eroded the value of the money, giving Faisal a vested interest in helping to contain the damage he himself inflicted on the economies of the West. Since Israeli forces did not withdraw to the 1949 Armistice Line, the majority of scholars believe that the embargo was a failure. Roy Licklieder, in his 1988 book Political Power and the Arab Oil Weapon , concluded that
22444-594: The oil embargo were the Netherlands (because the Dutch Foreign Minister Max van der Stoel was strongly pro-Israeli) and Portugal (in a support of show for the independence movements in Portugal's African colonies), but the shortage of oil in the United States led to sharp price rises in all of the European nations. The embargo itself did not cause much economic difficulty in the United States as
22625-474: The oil embargo, oil exports from the Middle East to the West were down by 60–70% by November 1973. Japan and the nations of western Europe imported some 75% of their oil from the Near East, and the embargo led to immediate and sharp price raises as Lacey noted that "competing desperately for dwindling supplies, consumers showed themselves willing to pay unparalleled money for their oil". Saudi Arabia had 25% of
22806-530: The oil embargo. On November 7, 1973, Kissinger flew to Riyadh to meet King Faisal and ask him to end the oil embargo in exchange for promising to be "evenhanded" with the Arab-Israeli dispute. As the plane carrying him prepared to land in Riyadh, Kissinger was clearly nervous at the prospect of negotiating with the stern Wahhabi Faisal who had a marked dislike of Jews. Kissinger discovered that King Faisal
22987-484: The oil shock of 1973–1974 is still fondly remembered in Saudi Arabia as the "age of abundance" where nearly everyone had a significant increase in their standard of living. The wealth and corruption generated by the oil shock led to a fundamentalist backlash in Saudi Arabia. On 20 November 1979, Islam's most holiest shrine, the Grand Mosque of Mecca, was seized by a group of fanatics who proclaimed themselves to be
23168-451: The only high-speed water vehicles making advances at this time; competing technologies included the hydrofoil and the pump-jet . As early as 1969, rival hovercraft manufacturers had encountered commercial difficulties and been liquidated . Throughout the 1970s, the BHC made several advances in its skirt technology, such as requiring less power to keep inflated; the company also produced extensions of its existing hovercraft range, which had
23349-570: The only year-round public hovercraft service in the world still in operation serves between the Isle of Wight and Southsea in the UK. Oita Hovercraft is planning to resume services in Oita, Japan in 2024. Although now a generic term for the type of craft, the name Hovercraft itself was a trademark owned by Saunders-Roe (later British Hovercraft Corporation (BHC), then Westland ), hence other manufacturers' use of alternative names to describe
23530-552: The past we could not lift our heads up. Now we can". Faisal promised to give to Egypt a quality of aid worth $ 200 million US dollars to assist with the war effort, and stated he was willing to use the "oil weapon" if necessary to support Egypt. Kissinger promised the Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir the United States would replace its losses in equipment after the war, but sought initially to delay arm shipments to Israel as he believed it would improve
23711-433: The people. In Iran, the Shah who was aware by 1974 that he had developed the cancer that was to ultimately kill him in 1980 pushed very strongly for his "Great Civilization" for rapid modernization not the least because he wanted to see the "Great Civilization" before his death, which explained his grandiose announcements. The new wealth generated by the "oil shock" allowed for Chairman Houari Boumédiène of Algeria to become
23892-420: The pilot and co-pilot with only a slight reduction in hover height proportional to the load carried. The SR.N1 did not have any skirt, using instead the peripheral air principle that Cockerell had patented. It was later found that the craft's hover height was improved by the addition of a skirt of flexible fabric or rubber around the hovering surface to contain the air. The skirt was an independent invention made by
24073-614: The possibility of establishing a permanent service is still under consideration. Since the Channel routes abandoned hovercraft, and pending any reintroduction on the Scottish route, the United Kingdom's only public hovercraft service is that operated by Hovertravel between Southsea ( Portsmouth ) and Ryde on the Isle of Wight . From the 1960s, several commercial lines were operated in Japan, without much success. In Japan
24254-405: The posted price of oil was increased and, due to a decline in the value of the US dollar relative to gold, certain anti-inflationary measures were enacted. Because of a severe drain on U.S. gold reserves, leading to higher inflation and lack of confidence in the strength of the dollar, President Nixon issued Executive Order 11615 on August 15, 1971, closing the " gold window ". This action made
24435-567: The price of oil by 400% within a matter of days threw the world's economy into a sharp recession with unemployment mounting and inflation raging came as a profound shock. The end of what the French called the Trente Glorieuses ("Glorious Thirty" [years]) led to a mood of widespread pessimism in the West with the Financial Times running a famous headline in late 1973 saying "The Future will be subject to Delay". Kurt Waldheim,
24616-571: The price of the older SR.N6 in both respects. The type was produced in quantity not only by the BHC, but was also constructed under licence by companies in both Australia and China . While plans to procure the BH.7 for the British Army were terminated during 1968, government support continued to be forthcoming; the Ministry of Technology ordered a single BH.7, helping to facilitate the launch of
24797-535: The prospects for applying an entirely different form of powerplant to a new generation of hovercraft increasingly attractive. The BHC successfully developed its own original hovercraft designs during its existence. The BH.7 Wellington class is a military-oriented model, while the British Hovercraft Corporation AP1-88 is a medium-size diesel-powered hovercraft. The AP1-88 was notably cheaper to operate and to purchase, being half
24978-675: The remaining two-thirds was divided between financing the Joint Services Military Trials Unit based at Lee-on-Solent and the National Physical Laboratory 's Hythe division. In addition to financing, the British Government was also keen to implement a regulatory framework for the hovercraft sector, including the implementation of safety certification, leading to the Hovercraft Act of 1968. However, not all commitments made by
25159-505: The river is beginning to freeze to minimize damage to the river ice surface. The hovercraft is able to operate during the freeze-up period; however, this could potentially break the ice and create hazards for villagers using their snowmobiles along the river during the early winter. In 2006, Kvichak Marine Industries of Seattle , US built, under licence, a cargo/passenger version of the Hoverwork BHT130 . Designated 'Suna-X', it
25340-522: The second summit of Islamic states in Lahore (which, unlike the first summit that Faisal had chaired in 1969, was not boycotted by Iraq and Syria ) where he was acclaimed as a conquering hero who humiliated and humbled the West by wrecking its economy. The prime minister of Pakistan, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, opened the conference by stating: "The armies of Pakistan are the armies of Islam. We shall enter Jerusalem as brothers-in-arms!" Only on March 18, 1974 did
25521-643: The secretary-general of the United Nations in an address to the General Assembly complained about "the note of helplessness and fatalism creeping into world affairs". The sudden and abrupt end of the "long summer" of prosperity in 1973-1974 played a major role in the pessimistic mood that characterized the culture of the rest of the 1970s. In 1975, a report to Congress from the Federal Energy Administration estimated that
25702-567: The services were subsequently stopped due to the lack of sufficient water transport infrastructure . In Finland, small hovercraft are widely used in maritime rescue and during the rasputitsa ("mud season") as archipelago liaison vehicles. In England, hovercraft of the Burnham-on-Sea Area Rescue Boat (BARB) are used to rescue people from thick mud in Bridgwater Bay . Avon Fire and Rescue Service became
25883-425: The sheet of fast-moving air presented a sort of physical barrier to the air on either side of it. This effect, which he called the "momentum curtain", could be used to trap high-pressure air in the area inside the curtain, producing a high-pressure plenum that earlier examples had to build up with considerably more airflow. In theory, only a small amount of active airflow would be needed to create lift and much less than
26064-428: The skirt design demonstrated a problem; it was originally expected that pressure applied to the outside of the skirt would bend it inward, and the now-displaced airflow would cause it to pop back out. What actually happened is that the slight narrowing of the distance between the walls resulted in less airflow, which in turn led to more air loss under that section of the skirt. The fuselage above this area would drop due to
26245-511: The smoothness required for operation. By the 1950s, Ford showed a number of toy models of cars using the system, but mainly proposed its use as a replacement for wheels on trains, with the Levapads running close to the surface of existing rails. In 1931, Finnish aero engineer Toivo J. Kaario began designing a developed version of a vessel using an air cushion and built a prototype Pintaliitäjä ('Surface Glider'), in 1937. His design included
26426-502: The use of oil as a weapon. In 1970, President Nasser of Egypt died and was succeeded by Anwar Sadat , a man who believed in the diplomacy of surprise, in engaging in sudden moves to upset the diplomatic equilibrium. Sadat liked to say that his favourite game was backgammon , a game where skill and persistence was rewarded, but was best won by sudden gambles, making an analogy between how he played backgammon and conducted his diplomacy. Under Nasser, Egypt and Saudi Arabia had engaged what
26607-407: The vehicles. There have been many attempts to understand the principles of high air pressure below hulls and wings. Hovercraft are unique in that they can lift themselves while still, differing from ground effect vehicles and hydrofoils that require forward motion to create lift. The first mention, in the historical record of the concepts behind surface-effect vehicles, to use the term hovering
26788-574: The war that would be "peaceful, just and honorable" to both sides. Saqqaf reported to King Faisal that Nixon told him that he ended the Vietnam war on an honorable basis and now intended to end the October war in the same manner. Israel took heavy losses in men and material during the fighting against Egypt and Syria, and on October 18, 1973, Meir requested $ 850 million worth of American arms and equipment to replace its material losses. Nixon decided characteristically to act on an epic scale and instead of
26969-417: The warning that Faisal was considerably tougher, more intelligent and more ruthless than his half-brother Saud whom he had deposed in 1964, and his threats were serious. Kissinger declined to meet the four CEOs. In an assessment done by Kissinger and his staff about the Middle East in the summer of 1973, the repeated statements by Sadat about waging jihad against Israel were dismissed as empty talk while
27150-478: The warnings from King Faisal were likewise regarded as inconsequential. In September 1973, Nixon fired Rogers as Secretary of State and replaced him with Kissinger. Kissinger was later to state he had not been given enough time to know the Middle East as he settled into the State Department's office at Foggy Bottom as Egypt and Syria attacked Israel on October 6, 1973. On October 6, 1973, Egypt attacked
27331-448: The way his subjects had been seduced into a consumerist lifestyle, becoming lost in a sense of "melancholia". Faisal's son, Crown Prince Mohammad told Lacey in 1981: "The profligacy, the greed, he felt he could not stem it. He become so bound up in his work, there was almost nothing private of him left". A sign of the changed values was that despite the total ban on alcohol in Saudi Arabia that drinking along with drug use become common with
27512-533: The withholding of the 638,500 barrels of oil which the Saudi Arabia had been selling to America every day for the first 10 months of 1973 ever come, in itself, to jeopardizing the power or diverting the policies of the United States, since it accounted for less than 4 percent of America's daily 17 million barrel consumption. It was the interaction which Faisal's embargo had with other forces that made it so decisive. Arab politics had an immediate multiplier effect". Because every Arab state except for Iraq and Libya joined
27693-468: The world's economy into the steepest economic contraction since the Great Depression. The "long summer" of prosperity in the post-war years had made possible the "swinging sixties" and the related rise of a rebellious youth culture as it was very easy to be hedonist and/or in rebellion against traditional values in a time of unprecedented affluence and prosperity. Lacey wrote about the impact of
27874-452: The world's oil reserves and the embargo imposed on the United States led to shortages of oil in the United States, which set an inflationary spiral as the new high prices for oil in the American market led to sharp increases of the price of oil in nations not subjected to the embargo. When the Iranian state oil company held an auction on December 16, 1973, bids for some $ 17 US dollars per barrel of oil were made. In late December 1973, OPEC held
28055-609: The world, via religious charities such as the al-Haramain Foundation , which often also distributed funds to violent Sunni extremist groups such as Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. The 400% increase in the world oil prices led to extravagant promises being made by the leaders of oil-producing nations. The Shah of Iran told his subjects in a speech in December 1973 that he was launching "Great Civilization" project that would make Iran into
28236-461: The younger members of the House of Saud. James Akins, the American ambassador in Riyadh reported; "the sky over Riyadh is black with vultures with new get-richer-quicker plans under their wings". In 1974, property prices in Riyadh doubled on a weekly basis for the entire year as the prosperity led to a real estate speculation bubble that was often compared to the Klondike gold rush of 1898–1899. At
28417-531: Was Stalin who said there had to be a Jewish state...Israel is advancing Communist objectives...Among those of the Jewish faith there are those who embrace Zionism...Most of the immigration to Israel is from the Soviet Union...They want to establish a Communist base right in the Middle East...And now, all over the world, the Jews are putting themselves into positions of authority". On February 22, 1974, King Faisal chaired
28598-552: Was a worthy companion to Lê Đức Thọ in terms of stubbornness as the king accused the United States of being biased in favor of Israel, going on in a long rant about the balefulness of "Jewish Communists" in Russia and Israel, and despite all of Kissinger's efforts to charm him, refused to end the oil embargo. Faisal told Kissinger: "The United States used to stand up to aggression-you did that in World War Two and in 1956 during
28779-471: Was an immediate shift on the part of consumers to the lighter and more fuel efficient vehicles produced by the Japanese and West German automobile industries, sending the American automobile industry into decline. The years from 1945 to 1973 had been a period of unprecedented prosperity in the West, a "long summer" that many believed would never end, and its abrupt end in 1973 as the oil embargo which increased
28960-491: Was appalled by the way that his subjects became materialistic, devoted only to conspicuous consumption and greed as they lost interest in Islam. Lacey wrote: "The spiritual dangers of easy affluence distressed him more. His simple gesture of piety and honor seemed to have opened a Pandora's Box that threatened to turn his realm into a parody of all he held dear". In the last two of years of his life, Faisal fell into depression over
29141-436: Was applied to the outside of this design, air pressure in the rest of the skirt forced the inner wall to move in as well, keeping the channel open. Although there was some deformation of the curtain, the airflow within the skirt was maintained and the lift remained relatively steady. Over time, this design evolved into individual extensions over the bottom of the slots in the skirt, known as "fingers". Through these improvements,
29322-548: Was asked to slow down a little. On examination of the craft afterwards, it was found that she had been dished in the bow due to excessive speed, damage that was never allowed to be repaired, and was from then on affectionately referred to as the 'Royal Dent'. Testing quickly demonstrated that the idea of using a single engine to provide air for both the lift curtain and forward flight required too many trade-offs. A Blackburn Marboré turbojet for forward thrust and two large vertical rudders for directional control were added, producing
29503-558: Was becoming more and more unhappy with the United States, saying he wanted America to pressure Israel to return all the lands captured in the Six Day War of 1967. In a later interview, Yamani accused Kissinger of not taking his warning seriously, saying all he did was to ask him not to speak anymore of this threat. Angry at Kissinger, Yamani in an interview with the Washington Post on April 19, 1973, warned that King Faisal
29684-401: Was by Swedish scientist Emanuel Swedenborg in 1716. The shipbuilder John Isaac Thornycroft patented an early design for an air cushion ship / hovercraft in the 1870s, but suitable, powerful, engines were not available until the 20th century. In 1915, the Austrian Dagobert Müller von Thomamühl (1880–1956) built the world's first "air cushion" boat ( Luftkissengleitboot ). Shaped like
29865-475: Was considering an oil embargo. At the time, the general feeling in Washington was the Saudis were bluffing and nothing would come of their threat to impose an oil embargo. The fact that Faisal's ineffectual half brother King Saud had imposed a cripplingly oil embargo on Britain and France during the Suez War of 1956 was not considered an important precedent. The CEOs of four of America's oil companies had after speaking to Faisal arrived in Washington in May 1973 with
30046-422: Was envisioned to revolutionise the transportation system, with personal hovering self-driving cars that could speed up to 2,400 km/h (1,500 mph). The idea of the modern hovercraft is most often associated with Christopher Cockerell , a British mechanical engineer. Cockerell's group was the first to develop the use of a ring of air for maintaining the cushion, the first to develop a successful skirt, and
30227-459: Was known as the Arab Cold War , but Sadat got along very well with King Faisal of Saudi Arabia , forming an alliance between the most populous Arab state and the wealthiest Arab state. Unlike the secularist Nasser, Sadat was a pious Muslim and he had a strong personal rapport with King Faisal, who was an equally pious Muslim. The man largely in charge of American foreign policy, the National Security Adviser, Henry Kissinger , later admitted that he
30408-437: Was later expanded to include Portugal , Rhodesia , and South Africa . In March 1974, OAPEC lifted the embargo, but the price of oil had risen by nearly 300%: from US$ 3 per barrel ($ 19/ m ) to nearly US$ 12 per barrel ($ 75/m ) globally. Prices in the United States were significantly higher than the global average. After it was implemented, the embargo caused an oil crisis, or "shock", with many short- and long-term effects on
30589-497: Was like and was told: "Well, Dr. Henry, he will probably go on with you about Communism and the Jews". King Faisal's two great hatreds were Communism and Zionism as he believed that the Soviet Union and Israel were plotting together against Islam. When King Faisal was shown a translation into Arabic of The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion , he instantly believed in the authenticity of The Protocols and therefore talked to anyone who would listen about what he had learned, despite
30770-416: Was needed at the Riyassa Palace immediately. Yamani told the king: "The TV news goes out at nine. If you make a decision now, we can get it announced at once". The king replied "Write this down" and announced he was placing a total embargo on the United States. The embargo was accompanied by gradual monthly production cuts—by December, production had been cut to 25% of September levels. This contributed to
30951-464: Was not the best considered decision we made". The arms lift enraged King Faisal of Saudi Arabia and he retaliated on October 20, 1973, by placing a total embargo on oil shipments to the United States, to be joined by all of the other oil-producing Arab states except Iraq and Libya. Faisal was angry that Israel had only asked for $ 850 million worth of American weapons, and instead received an unsolicited $ 2.2 billion worth of weapons, which he perceived as
31132-483: Was organized after the oil companies slashed the posted price of oil, but the posted price of oil remained consistently higher than the market price of oil between 1961 and 1972. In 1963, the Seven Sisters controlled 86% of the oil produced by OPEC countries, but by 1970 the rise of "independent oil companies" had decreased their share to 77%. The entry of three new oil producers— Algeria , Libya and Nigeria —meant that by 1970, 81 oil companies were doing business in
31313-487: Was peaking and could not keep pace with increasing demand from vehicles. The U.S. was importing 350 million barrels (56 million cubic metres) per year by the late 1950s, mostly from Venezuela and Canada . Because of transportation costs and tariffs, it never purchased much oil from the Middle East. In 1973, US production had declined to 16% of global output. Eisenhower imposed quotas on foreign oil that would stay in place between 1959 and 1973. Critics called it
31494-458: Was powered by a 450 hp Alvis Leonides engine powering a vertical fan in the middle of the craft. In addition to providing the lift air, a portion of the airflow was bled off into two channels on either side of the craft, which could be directed to provide thrust. In normal operation this extra airflow was directed rearward for forward thrust and blew over two large vertical rudders that provided directional control. For low-speed manoeuvrability,
31675-453: Was powered by two turboprop aero-engines and driven by propellers . During the 1960s, Saunders-Roe developed several larger designs that could carry passengers, including the SR.N2 , which operated across the Solent , in 1962, and later the SR.N6 , which operated across the Solent from Southsea to Ryde on the Isle of Wight for many years. In 1963 the SR.N2 was used in experimental service between Weston-super-Mare and Penarth under
31856-473: Was so engrossed with the Paris peace talks to end the Vietnam war that he and others in Washington missed the significance of the Egyptian-Saudi alliance. At the same time that Sadat moved closer to Saudi Arabia, he also wanted a rapprochement with the United States and to move Egypt away from its alliance with the Soviet Union. In 1971, the US had information that the Arab states were willing to implement another embargo. In July 1972, Sadat expelled all 16,000 of
32037-419: Was the Suez Crisis in 1956 when the United Kingdom, France and Israel invaded Egypt. During the conflict the Syrians sabotaged both the Trans-Arabian Pipeline and the Iraq–Baniyas pipeline , which disrupted the supply of oil to Western Europe. The second instance was when war broke out between Egypt and Israel in 1967, but despite continued Egyptian and Syrian enmity against Israel, the embargo lasted only
32218-426: Was the Shah of Iran, and the Italian historian Giuliano Garavini has argued that the leader most responsible for the West's economic problems during the "oil shock" was not King Faisal, but rather the Shah. Some of the nations that were classified as "friendly" to the Arab viewpoint in regards to the Arab-Israeli dispute such as France and Belgium were the ones who suffered the most from the worldwide inflation caused by
32399-462: Was the large SR.N4 Mountbatten class hovercraft; it was the largest civil-orientated hovercraft to ever be put into service; several were completed and used in revenue services across the English Channel for multiple decades. Later on, the BHC developed their own newer hovercraft designs, such as the military-oriented BH.7 Wellington class and the medium-size diesel-powered British Hovercraft Corporation AP1-88 . These vehicles made advances in
32580-409: Was the troublesome issue of where to safety store the spent nuclear rods that emitted a toxic level of radioactivity for centuries afterward in an cost-effective manner. The issue of the spent nuclear rods was especially difficult because in a classic case of NIMBYism , communities proved very unwilling to accept a storage place for the inevitable by-product of nuclear power, the spent nuclear rods, with
32761-542: Was to kill hundreds of thousands. OPEC-member states raised the prospect of nationalization of oil company holdings. Most notably, Saudi Arabia nationalized Aramco in 1980 under the leadership of Saudi oil minister Ahmed Zaki Yamani . As other OPEC nations followed suit, the cartel's income soared. Saudi Arabia undertook a series of ambitious five-year development plans. The biggest began in 1980, funded at $ 250 billion. Other cartel members also undertook major economic development programs. Control of oil became known as
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