Go green, go fast across the English Channel?
 

Brittany Ferries are looking to go green and fast with battery powered ferries that go at up to 180mph (~300kph).

https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/brittany-ferries-unveils-flying-ferry-5532568?fbclid=IwAR3hkCW2X_F2rJxoZAFNshiRGTIokBFc0 2rNi6ph6fMSFWViCwoVX_zBY-s

The first time I crossed the Channel with a car we flew - Silver City Airways ran Bristol Freighters which took 2 or 3 cars (depending on their size) and 12 passengers. About a 15 minute flight as I recall.

Back to the future...

I remember watching one of the Bristols unloading at le Touquet airport some time about 1963-64. Cars were a lot smaller and lighter then.

It's an Ekranoplan. What the CIA called the Caspian sea monster in the 1970's

https://i.postimg.cc/9Mt6vVK9/300px-Lun-Ekranoplan.jpg

Fly by wire will have solved the problem that this is an aircraft permanently in "coffin corner" between its stall speed and maximum ceiling, but I see three remaining problems. The energy to fly at 30 feet means noise. You can deal with engine noise but the aerodynamics are no glider. It will have to be seaworthy in case weather gets the better of the crew or mechanical defect. This isn't a 1960's government vanity project like the hovercraft so I bet they go to town on elven safety. This will make it heavy so you wonder if the payload will be economical? The turning circle is miles unless you land. Are the authorities going to allow a passenger carrying missile in the world's busiest shipping lane?

It's an interesting project, I wish them luck.

Andy

I don’t see it being a problem crossing from the UK to Roscoff and Cherbourg - going across from Dover to Calais is somewhat different. As long as they have the height to see a few miles ahead it should not be an issue - at sea level you can see an object 1m above the sea from a distance of 3.6km. Realistically the height of the radar is going to be at least 10m above sea level which gives a range of 11.3km - plenty of time to adjust course - around 2 minutes and 20 seconds at 180mph.

There are some really obscure websites out there - http://www.ringbell.co.uk/info/hdist.htm - and this has got to be one of them.

The problems here being:

1) The vehicle literally does not exist, it's a computer rendering, and if it doesn't exist as a working prototype in 2021, then it sure as hell is not starting passenger operations in 2028.

2) If they build it, especially as a battery-powered model, then it will almost certainly not have the payload for cars or bikes - much like the little hydrofoil that used to run a passenger service between the south of Sakhalin and the northern tip of Japan.

3) Who the hell is going to pay a premium to quickly fly as a passenger between two coastal ports and then have to spend 3x the flight time in border queues on either side of the channel?

People always post the photo of the Lun above - but that was a prototype of a warplane, a fast missile platform designed to kill US aircraft carriers by coming in under the radar, launching a barrage of cruise missiles from a standoff distance of the carrier's battlegroup, and GTFOing before the enemy CAP notices. Even for the Soviet Union at the height of the Cold War, it turned out to be economically unviable - unlike the Orlyonok, a later heavy cargo model designed as a fast landing craft, which actually was in service with the Soviet Navy for a minute.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/f0/47...4ce8d93fdc.jpg

And then of course it turned out that there was no real use for them.

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I live on one side of (what used to be) a very busy ferry route, Tallinn to Helsinki, millions of passengers a year, hourly departures by multiple operators. Every attempt to run anything other than a massive car-and-truck ferry has failed miserably, including helicopters, passenger-only hydrofoils, and fast CATs that took vehicles. If you can't stuff your hold full of lorries, you can't make the economics work.

I think you've more chance of hitching a lift from a bunch of pigs flying across to France than booking a place on that. It looks like someone's taken the worst characteristics of aircraft and hovercraft and cobbled them together in a food blender. If neither of those could operate profitably across the busiest stretch of the channel this thing has zero chance. And that's before trying to deal with the 'you're saying it only flies 10ft off the ground - what happens when it hits a wave at 150mph' public scepticism. It's an Elon Musk passenger flights into space fantasy but for poor people and they'll vote with their feet right to the ferry terminal.

Ekranoplane

I suspect that will go the same way as the hovercraft that used to ply the route. A typical 1960s concept backed by national vanity that said "if it can be done, do it". Like Concorde, nobody ever thought to ask whether customers actually wanted it. As a result the hovercraft couldn't operate in rough weather, were expensive and had limited carrying capacity and when the tunnel opened it was faster and cheaper. They no longer operate, and I wouldn't give much credibility to reports in a local newspaper claiming to have a scoop on a world beating new technology that only exists on a PC screen.

https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/976/cp...m101725480.jpg

I used to enjoy the hovercraft and preferred them to the ferries in a way that I've never done with the tunnel. It was partly because I don't suffer from seasickness so if it moved around a bit it didn't bother me, whereas others were reaching for the paper bags before it even got off the beach. Of course with those aircraft type seats it did mean you could be sat next to some pretty unsavoury characters for the trip. Speaking as one of those unsavoury characters (after four wet days on the road it was an apt description) I once had a rather elegant middle aged lady reluctant to sit next to me on a particularly rough day but as the hovercraft was fully booked she had no alternative. The boot was soon on the other foot though as she spent the next half an hour vomiting over herself, me, both seats and the floor.

Having said that, the ferries really have improved since the tunnel came along, even if they are a bit slower these days. I think they've accepted they can't compete on speed so they might as well turn down the wick a bit and save some fuel. People who choose the boat are not going to be that bothered if it takes a bit longer than it used to.

I would be interested in the balance of weight/freight ratio between a classic fueled hoovercraft and a battery powered one. It seems today everything is new technology if an electric engine and a battery added to an outdated vehicle concept.

They do still operate - just.
Portsmouth - Ryde, Isle of Wight

I mentioned this at the stables I go to occasionally - the horses looked very worried.

They always forget the human aspect.

I travel to Ireland a fair bit with work. I prefer the ferry. No getting felt up and X-rayed by some failed bouncer. No endless rush-wait-rush cycle. No limit on how much stuff you can take. Better food and the space to get the laptop out if I need to work. None of the rubbish Queasy Jet or Lieing Air endlessly come up with to try and fleece you. The ferry goes in any weather and doesn't suddenly develop engine trouble when its less than 75% full, it's never been diverted to Luton.

The Ekranoplan would add so much of this it would be like flying, yet it would need to operate from a port that won't have parking etc. If this is real they are expecting the total change in travel St. Greta's mob wants. You won't be flying Gatwick-Paris because it'll be banned. You won't be parking at the port because everyone below cabinet minister level will be on the peasant wagon anyway.

It still doesn't address that by the time you've done security and safety checks the ferry is half way there and your main course has been served.

Andy

I used to use the hovercraft a lot - faster than the ferries, and although they didn't run in very bad weather they ran most of the time, and if they didn't you could change to a ferry.

I once rode the hovercraft on the bridge/flight deck, from lift off to settling down the other side - really interesting.