'The Princess Anne' enters the harbour at Dover, England.
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The hovercraft was invented by British engineer Christopher Cockerell (later Sir Christopher). He produced his first working model in 1956 and three years later his first full size test craft was produced by Saunders Roe. On 25 July 1959 the, Cockerell designed, Saunders Roe Nautical One (SRN1), successfully completed the first cross Channel hovercraft crossing from Calais to Dover, exactly fifty years after Bleriot’s first Channel flight.
The first regular passenger service from Dover started on 1 August 1968 when the Dover to Boulogne service was inaugurated by the SRN4 hovercraft “Princess Margaret”. The craft was owned by Seaspeed, the hovercraft operating subsidiary of British Railways, and ran from the new hoverport built at the Eastern Docks. In August 1969 a second SRN4 was delivered and the “Princess Anne” opened a second route from Dover to Calais.
In 2000 Hoverspeed decided to end hovercraft operation. The abolition of duty-free sales in June 1999 had resulted in a significant drop in passenger numbers. The hovercraft were replaced by seacats, which could carry nearly twice as many cars and passengers although with a slower crossing time to Calais of 45 minutes. The last hovercraft crossing was on Sunday 1 October 2000 and the seacats took over the service the following day.
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Love Poem No. 1
As the hovercraft puffed its skirts
against the concrete apron, so I flew -
Dover harbour a spray of images
around my spinning form as my brother
swung me from the salt-crust lawns
over the edge of the cliff, a handgrasp away
from learning the dangers of trust. Now the last hovercraft has been scrapped
for spares I can discover new dangers
beyond the crumbled castle's keep. Seduction
in moonlight is a walk through stiff grasses
to watch the sea bolster Dover below;
to feel the wind wipe the rain
across my naked back as I dance with you
on the edge of the cliff, eyes forward -
not down - each step an experiment
in my trust of flinty contact.
-- Rik Roots
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