New Channel club members

It is quiet this time of year, and because of that, things get tidied up. And this newspaper cutting has come to light.

It seems that back in 1980 Bodie and Doyle "the professionals" did a channel crossing in a Pindair inflatable hovercraft.

At the time they were the coolist dudes around. And were every young lads idea of what they wanted to be !

They are now inducted into this exclusive channel crosssing club.

Hard to realise it is the same man who now plays a Catholic priest on TV.!

Flying Fish hovercraft in Moscow

This craft is just off to Moscow, it will be used on the big rivers in and near Moscow. For a long time in the winter the rivers are frozen solid, so a hovercraft is a good option. And when the summer comes it is a very pleasant run for as long as you like through wonderful country side.

It is getting on for 500 miles to get to the sea, so plenty of scope for a day out !

This craft is fitted with a Russian built Rotax 503 2 stroke engine, with electric start. This is at the request of the customer. It means spares etc are readily available there, and as fuel cost and noise are not a big issue there it makes sense for them.

The craft will also be put on display at several big leisure and sport exhibitions, so we have hopes of other people seeing the whole new world that would open up to them by having a hovercraft.

After all, a hover, especially one that is not water cooled, really can be used all year round.

We did not fit decals on this craft, as the person in Russia will fit his own, ours would not have been easily understood !

Jenny's New Craft

Jenny Campbell took delivery of her new, up-rated, single seater craft. finished in a nice sparkly yellow and red.
As a first outing the weather could have been better, but late October is not maybe the best time !After battling round to the hover museum from the Griffon works in Southampton,on Saturday, Jenny and her Dad decided to call it a day, and took the craft back by road.
But next day Sunday, they set off again and together with 7 other craft, including a big Griffon, hovered to Portsmouth harbour, had a tour round the harbour before returning to the Griffon works.
On the return journey she clocked up an 18 mile run at an average of 38knots, so she is well pleased.The pictures are of the road crossing to enter the Museum compound.
Link: Flyingfishhovercraft.co.uk
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Treasure Hunt At Berekley

On The Weekend of 13/14th September we all went over to the river Severn for Britain's premier cruising event, THE BERKELEY TREASURE HUNT.

We were very lucky with the weather, Saturday, the day of the actual hunt, was sunny and warm with little wind.

Approx 28 craft of all sorts took part. The idea is to follow maps to a set point, answer a question, take it back to control and then you are given a new destination. 10 different points in all, bonus points for good answers, and correct navigation.

It involves going to the destination and getting as close as you can to the point. Then one team member gets out of the craft, up the muddy bank to find the answer. This is the reason everyone involved is covered in mud, as can be seen in the pics. They deliberately made it so even a hover could not get there, but it is great fun, and provides endless enjoyment.

On the Sunday, despite a misty start to the morning, a cruise down to the big Severn bridge for almost everyone and then some craft went on to the river Wye. The first back returned at about 12.30, the more ambitious cruisers did not return until about 3pm.

There were about 7 flying fish craft at the event, although the event was won by Dan Newton in a 100 hp craft - sometimes you just can't beat big horsepower!!!

This is a really great event. When the hunt is on, craft are in and out all the time and it lasts for about 5 hours without a break - lots of mud and challenging hovering, as good as it gets!

Big thanks to the organisiers for a brilliant weekend!

Hover craft show 2008

This week end Nelson Wood and I took a couple of craft to the hover show at The Hovercraft museum at Lee-on-Solent http://www.hovercraft-museum.org. We had a very enjoyable weekend, playing with craft, giving a few demos, and just spending a whole weekend talking hovercraft !

A couple of short cruises up and down the coast were easy and a bit of fun.

There is a bit of film on you tube " Hover Craft show 2008"

Thanks to every one at the show, they all made us very welcome, and we will be there next year for the special 4 day show.

BBC's 'Coast' Program drives a Flying Fish Hover!

A blustery and chilly tuesday saw us down the beach with Dr Alice Roberts and the team from the BBC's 'Coast' Program.

Having already visited Dover for a ride in a commercial Griffon Hovercraft, they came along to Ramsgate for a drive of the Marlin two seat hovercraft to help tell the story of the cross channel hovercraft service which started from the town in 1966.

Tutored by the Flying Fish team, Alice turned out to be a willing pupil! Ignoring pretty much all the instructions she was given, she cleared off down the beach and turned straight out to sea. She returned through the breakers soaking wet but with a huge smile on her face...it should make good TV when the program airs in Winter! Against the wishes of the producers, she shot off again for another ride - and afterwards described it as a brilliant experience.

Here's a few pictures from the day.





Flying Doctor!

Double Double Channel Crossing!

Playing inthe surf at Sangatte



Leaving Dover Harbour 6.30am



On the way back in Nelly spotted afriend of his who drives ferry's for aliving so the boys detoured to say 'hi!'


The drivers - Nelson & Russ

The team



Arriving at Sangatte


Pretty good conditions, but hardly flat calm when your 'boat' is only 3.1 metres long!

Living down in the South-East, 20 or so miles from France, we’ve been muttering about the possibility of a Channel crossing for a while now.

Flying Fish is based in Dover as well, so we always felt it was something that time, tide, weather, diaries and opportunity permitting – we needed to cross off the list!

A history of light hovers across the channel is pretty brief as I understand it. Somewhere around 1971, Nigel Beale crossed from Pegwell Bay (site of the Hoverport) via Deal to France, taking something like 3 hours. The craft was powered by three chainsaw engines…..a remarkable feat and one that made him the first to complete the crossing - it really was a heroic venture! In 1977 Kip McCollum of Osprey Hovercraft made a straightforward crossing from Dover to Calais, taking about 1h35mins. Though he left Dover in the company of a second craft, the other one got into all sorts of difficulties, eventually being recovered from the middle of a shipping lane.

And that’s it!

Since then, nothing. That’s the entire history (to the best of my knowledge) of Light Hover cross channel expeditions.

We decided we wanted to set a decent time, and to make sure it was safe and officially recorded, we enlisted the help of our good friend Lance Oram from the Channel Swimming & Piloting Federation www.channelswimming.net – nobody knows the route across the channel better as he spends the whole of the summer months racing across at one knot!

Our diaries and weather window finally came good on July 23^rd and we unloaded the craft at 6am on a slipway in Dover harbour - the harbour master, being a total killjoy, wouldn’t let us leave from the pad….. Nelson Wood (better known as ‘God in Orange’) brought his Flying Fish Marlin, and my son Russ had a similar craft. We brought two Ribs as support, both 6.5 metres. Nelsons Tornado and Lance’s Ocean, with Gary & Lee from Flying Fish and a photographer friend to take the all important pics!

We’d also managed to borrow some intercoms from a friend - Russ & Nellly were wearing noise canceling headsets connected to the VHF’s. Russ said that coupled with his Ipod, it was a comfortable, enjoyable crossing! The intercoms worked brilliantly and we could easily talk between the boats and craft.

The conditions, once clear of the harbour were great, with gentle rolling swell – no big deal and in fact, the crossing was actually pretty unremarkable - just what we wanted, no dramas! Cruising at around 24knots, we were quickly in sight of Sangatte beach, and a little later the hover abandoned the boats amongst the surf to ride gracefully onto the beach. Half the job done in 57 minutes!

Sangattes a funny place – nobody bats an eyelid. Lance has piloted amphibious cars, remote control planes, Ribs fitted with wheels, Jeremy Clarkson’s Nissank (sic) with the 225 outboard bolted to it….etc - nothing much surprises this sleepy little village anymore, least of all a couple of hovers!

The boys splashed a drop of petrol into the hovers (not really necessary, the Briggs motors had used around 6 litres each – by comparison, the boats had used 30!) and wandered into the village to buy some cheese and wine (as you do!) and then set out for the return leg. We’d decided to push very slightly harder on the way back and 52 minutes later we safely arrived back on the slipway in Dover. Our times each way were both quicker than the £1m (seriously!) amphibious car that Lance had taken across in July (they took 74 minutes) and Branson’s Aquacar crossing - Hovers Rule!

Kipper’s smoked, we were back for breakfast! J The press were waiting for us - TV, newspapers, radio all loved the story. Groping for an answer to the question ‘So why did you decide to make crossing?’ Russ could only mutter something about ‘Ummm, Errr, well its to celebrate the 40^th anniversary of the commencement of cross channel operations….’ Which may or may not be right, but they all picked up on it and reported it differently in each paper! The real answer is that – we wanted to!

We're all just chuffed to bits. To complete the return trip – and with two hovers - is a first and makes the Marlin the only current light hovercraft to have crossed the channel - and the only one ever to have made the return trip.

The ‘Channel Club’ is a pretty exclusive little club at the moment, with just 4(?) members. - Nigel beale, Kip McCollum, Nelson & Russ. It’s one that we hope grows. We genuinely hope that somebody will come along and smash our time, we know we could do it quicker and can promise a response!

These 4 stroke, quiet, reliable, economical craft make it so easy. Cruising is on the up, with some great craft out there operating week in, week out. Check out the hovercraft club bulletin board - modern craft are capable, genuine cruisers with no more limitations than a boat of comparable size. Pushing the Flying Fish to the limit in environments such as this is what has driven development so far, so fast.

A great big 'Thank You' to Dave Pearce for the photos!