Ground Effect Vehicle - History

History

By the 1920s, the "ground effect" phenomenon was well-known, as pilots found that their airplanes appeared to become more efficient as they neared the runway during landing. In 1934 the US National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics issued Technical Memorandum 771, Ground Effect on the Takeoff and Landing of Airplanes, which was a translation into English of a summary of research up to that point on the subject. The French author Maurice Le Sueur had added a suggestion based on this phenomenon: "Here the imagination of inventors is offered a vast field. The ground interference reduces the power required for level flight in large proportions, so here is a means of rapid and at the same time economic locomotion: Design an airplane which is always within the ground-interference zone. At first glance this apparatus is dangerous because the ground is uneven and the altitude called skimming permits no freedom of maneuver. But on large-sized aircraft, over water, the question may be attempted ..." Small numbers of experimental vehicles were built in Scandinavia and Finland, just before World War II. By the 1960s, the technology started to improve, in large part due to the independent contributions of Rostislav Alexeyev in the Soviet Union and German Alexander Lippisch, working in the United States. Alexeyev worked from his background as a ship designer whereas Lippisch worked as an aeronautical engineer. The influence of Alexeyev and Lippisch is still noticeable in most GEV vehicles seen today.