Originally Posted by
treadigraph
Used to be at school between Woodley and Reading, often saw transports out of Luton and perhaps East Midlands including AFREK and Redcoat Britannias, guess that would be the last time I saw one airborne, perhaps 40 years ago. Though... went across the Channel on Hoverspeed a coue of decades ago, weren't the big SRNs Proteus powered?
Yes, a Canadian relative said that Hovercraft was the closest thing they had experienced in a generation since a Trans-Canada Lockheed Constellation all the way from London to Vancouver, probably 20 hours overall (compared to 30 minutes in the Hovercraft), which had blasted their eardrums for several days afterwards. The Hovercraft was indeed Proteus powered, with Dowty props, just like the Brit.
But "Whispering Giant" the Hovercraft was certainly NOT.
Regarding the last one I saw airborne, I walked out on Dun Laoghaire pier in Ireland one evening in 1977, and an Aer Turas one glided most silently and elegantly past on long finals for 34 at Dublin. Since then I have to be content with the restored Monarch one on the Duxford ramp, right up to today, which comes briefly into view whenever I'm driving north on the M11 motorway.