I have seen the films/videos and they seem very interesting as a way to send troops and materiel to a staging area across the Azov. Wouldn’t work any where else probably.
They don’t seem efficient enough for commercial use, just military use.
“They don’t seem efficient enough for commercial use, just military use.”
There was a Caspian Ferry Service using these for a long time, that went away sometime in the 2000’s, I think.
I tried looking for it.
~They don’t seem efficient enough for commercial use, just military use.~
Or probably just the opposite. For military it is a large blinking target. Look at it as a hybrid of a boat and an airplane. Ekranoplane takes much heavier payload than airplane is ever capable to lift and it is almost as fast of that same horsepower. If you need to move some heavy stuff across the ocean in hours, not days these things might be useful. On the other hand I really doubt if they are able to negotiate bad weather.