Hovercraft Review

Abstract

16th APRIL 1958 is one of the most important dates in the history of hovercraft for it was on that day that Sir Christopher Cockerell (he was knighted in 1969) first visited the offices of the National Research Development Corporation, then located in Tilney Street, London. During this visit he gave a presentation of his hovercraft invention and showed a film of a model hovercraft engaged in ‘round the pole’ tests to his audience of two key NRDC executives: Lord Halsbury, NRDC's Managing Director, and Mr R. A. E. Walker, its Secretary. Both were impressed with the thoroughness of Cockerell's brief on his invention. The next day, when the inventor had returned to his Suffolk home, he received a telephone call from Mr Walker telling him that Lord Halsbury's on‐the‐spot decision to finance foreign patent applicatiois on the hovercraft invention had been endorsed. NRDC's links with the hovercraft had been forged. The foresight of that decision is impressive, particularly now, some twenty years later, when the hovercraft invention has developed into a wide range of applications well beyond the scope of hovercraft ferries. Indeed, few people — even the inventor himself — could have imagined that so many products might result from those early experiments using a pair of empty food tins, an industrial blower and a pair of iron kitchen scales!

Citation

MacDonald, N. (1978), "Hovercraft Review", Aircraft Engineering and Aerospace Technology, Vol. 50 No. 3, pp. 4-8. https://doi.org/10.1108/eb035430