Airboat - WikiHQ

thumb|An airboat

thumb|right|Airboating is a popular [[ecotourism attraction in the Florida Everglades]]

An airboat (also known as a bayou boat, fanboat, planeboat, or swamp boat) is a flat-bottomed watercraft propelled by an aircraft-type propeller and powered by either an aircraft or automotive engine. It is commonly used for fishing, hunting, recreation, and ecotourism.

Airboats are a common means of transportation in marshy or shallow areas where a standard inboard or outboard engine with a submerged propeller would be impractical, most notably in the Florida Everglades but also in the Kissimmee and St. Johns rivers, and the Mekong River and Delta, as well as the Louisiana bayous and Mesopotamian Marshes.

Overview

The airboat’s characteristic flat-bottom allows for easy navigation through marshes and other shallow bodies of water, including flooded areas. A version is also adapted for use on ice.

The lack of operating parts below the waterline makes the craft ideal for rescue operations. In a developing country like Iraq, however, an airboat may be purchased for as little as 2.5 million Iraqi dinars, or $2,147. However, most Soviet airboats are aerosleds (referred to as "aerosanis" in Russian). An aerosled is an aircraft propeller driven amphibious vehicle best described as a hybrid of a sled, airboat, and ground effect vehicle. Thousands of aerosleds were used as cargo and passenger vehicles in Siberia, where they cope excellently, working equally well in the icy Siberian winter and in muddy, marshy conditions of the Rasputitsa season (similar to the American mud season), when meltwater and thawing snow makes travel by road impossible. Aerosleds are still in use today. The Tupolev A-3 Aerosledge is a quintessential example of this type of vehicle; it can reach speeds of up to on snow and on water.

Brazilian aviation pioneer Alberto Santos-Dumont built a similar catamaran vessel for testing an aircraft engine in 1907, which he termed a hydrofoil. La Rapière II could achieve speeds of up to with two people on board and with 3-4 people on board.

Early airboats

thumb|left|upright|A 1917 [[Scientific American cover depicting a British Army airboat on the Tigris River during the World War I Mesopotamian Campaign.]]

The first airboats to see any real use date to 1915. The British Army used airboats, which they referred to as Lambert "Hydro-Glisseurs"," in the Mesopotamian Campaign of the First World War. These "Hydro-Glisseurs" were small, flat-bottomed hydroplanes with metal-clad wooden hulls propelled by a large aircraft fan that allowed them to reach speeds of up to . The first of these airboats, HG 1 Ariel, was constructed using the engine and propeller of a wrecked Royal Australian Air Force Farman MF.7 biplane and was provided to the forces in Mesopotamia by the British Raj. Following Ariel<nowiki>'s</nowiki> successful deployment in the campaign upriver to Kut in 1915–1916, Britain ordered seven purpose-built airboats from Charles de Lambert's eponymous company De Lambert. Eight of these vessels were in operation in 1917, increasing to nine by the 1918 Armistice. A dedicated repair slipway for these boats was built at the Motor Repair Dockyard in Baghdad, indicating both their importance to the British war effort and the difficulty of maintaining them.

Following the war, Lambert airboats were used as ferries on the shallow waters of the upper Yangtze River, on the Huangpu River, and elsewhere. Like their military counterparts, these airboats were manufactured in France, though they were assembled in Shanghai. They had drafts of only seven inches and could cruise at up to . Lambert airboats were also used widely on the upper Missouri River and on the marshes of the Florida Everglades.

Farman Aircraft, the company that built the engines for the WWI military airboats, began producing civilian airboats in the 1920s. It marketed airboats for use as water taxis and as light cargo vessels or patrol boats for French colonial governments. Its airboats sold for 25,000 to 50,000 francs depending on the model, a price that proved too steep for potential buyers; the company pulled out of the boat business by the end of the 1920s.

thumb|[[Farman airboat prototype Le Ricocheur in 1924. She was capable of speeds of up to 125 km/h (67.5 knots)]]

These early European airboats were significantly different from their modern counterparts. Compared to the airboats of today, early European airboats tended to be somewhat larger, had higher freeboards, and lacked a protective cage surrounding the propeller. They also had a different steering mechanism: early airboats were steered with a rudder in the water controlled by a steering wheel with throttle control provided by a gas pedal, like an automobile.

Airboats began to become popular in the United States in the 1930s, when they were independently invented and used by a number of Floridians, most living in or around the Everglades. Willard Yates holds the ignominious distinction of being the first person to die in an airboating accident, when the engine dislodged and sent the spinning propeller into him. Their boat, developed and used near Brigham City, Utah, is sometimes erroneously called the first airboat. At the Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge in northern Utah, Cecil S. Williams and G. Hortin Jensen sought a solution to the problem of conducting avian botulism studies in the shallow, marshy hinterlands. By installing a 40-horsepower Continental aircraft engine, purchased for $99.50, on a flat-bottomed 12-foot long aluminum boat, they built one of the first modern airboats. Their airboat had no seat, so the skipper was forced to kneel in the boat. They dubbed it the Alligator I as a response to a joking comment from US Fish and Wildlife Service headquarters that they should "get an alligator from Louisiana, saddle up and ride the critter during their botulism studies." Their airboat was the first to use an air rudder (a rudder directing the propeller exhaust rather than the water), a major improvement in modern airboat design.

The purpose of Williams, Young, and Jensen's airboat was to help preserve and protect bird populations and animal life at the world's largest migratory game bird refuge. The Bear River Migratory Bird Refuge near Brigham City, Utah, is a wetlands oasis amid the Great Basin Desert and an essential stopping point for birds migrating across North America. The need for a practical way to navigate a challenging environment of wetlands, shallow water, and thick mud helped inspire Williams, Young, and Jensen to create the flat-bottom airboat, which they initially called an "air thrust boat".

Many of the early airboats built at the refuge in Utah were shipped to Florida. Early records show it cost roughly $1,600 to build a boat, including the engine. Italy, Finland, Japan, Australia, and elsewhere. Prior to 1950, most airboats were manufactured in France by companies and individuals such as Farman, De Lambert, and René Couzinet.

According to a 2017 analysis by the Miami New Times, 64% of airboat accidents occurred due to operator error, attributable to one of three factors: Airboats with a "long-belt gear reduction drive unit" and an automobile engine reduce these risks by mounting the engine inside the hull, which lowers the center of gravity. Airboats can also be equipped with autoinflation devices that can reduce the risk of capsizing.

Florida state law also stipulates that airboats must have an "automotive-style factory muffler, underwater exhaust, or other manufactured device capable of adequately muffling the sound of the engine exhaust", and an international orange flag that is at least 10" by 12" flying from a mast or flagpole that is at least 10 feet taller than the lowest point on the boat, in order to increase visibility and reduce collisions.

The minimum age to operate an airboat in Florida is 14.

Rescue

thumb|A resident is transported by airboat after Hurricane Katrina

In recent years, airboats have proven indispensable for flood, shallow water, and ice rescue operations. As a result, they have grown in popularity for public safety uses.

During the flooding of New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina, August 29, 2005, airboats from across the United States rescued thousands of flood victims. Thirty airboats crewed by civilian volunteers evacuated over 1,100 patients and 4,000 medical personnel and family members from four downtown New Orleans hospitals in less than 36 hours. This "Cajun Navy" morphed into a grassroots volunteer search and rescue organization that has deployed to rescue people during Hurricane Harvey, Hurricane Florence, and other natural disasters.

Numerous articles have been published in fire-rescue trade journals such as Fire Engineering and National Fire and Rescue Magazine describing the advantages, capabilities, and benefits of using airboats for water rescue operations, and providing in-depth description of actual water rescue incidents, including the flooding of New Orleans.

Airboats are particularly effective at water rescues in shallow, marshy, or icy winter environments. Airboats are partially amphibious and can therefore navigate effectively over obstacles, such as partially submerged buildings and wreckage or sea ice, that would stop a normal boat. In ice rescues, use of airboats cuts the average rescue time from 45 to 60 minutes to seven to 12 minutes, according to data from Minnesota fire departments. They are also faster, larger, safer, and more durable than other small boats used in ice rescues.

Though airboats are highly effective at water and ice rescues, airboats and helicopters do not work well together. Rotor wash from low-flying helicopters can push and even capsize airboats. During post-Katrina rescue operations, a helicopter's rotor wash was reported to have capsized one airboat, and many airboats were blown into the sides of buildings, standing utility poles, and bridge pilings by low-flying helicopters. In addition to the use of airboats by the British Army in the Mesopotamian Campaign of WWI and by the Soviet Union in the Eastern Front of WWII, airboats have been used by the US Army and Iraqi security forces in the Vietnam and Iraq wars, respectively.

thumb|left|[[MIKE Force|US Special Forces Aircat airboat in Vietnam]]

During the Vietnam War the Hurricane Aircat airboat was used by U.S. Special Forces and South Vietnamese troops to patrol riverine and marshy areas where larger boats could not go. Two of these airboats were also used by the Khmer National Navy after they were captured from the U.S. Special Forces by the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN) in September 1967.

Airboats are also used in Texas and Iraq for border patrol. The airboats used in Iraq were supplied by American companies and assembled in Iraq by American civilian contractors, and they are used by both American and Iraqi forces to patrol the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, the marshes of southeastern Iraq, and the Shatt al-Arab waterway, the latter two of which include parts of the Iran-Iraq border. Modern Iraqi military airboats are long, powered by 454 hp engines hooked up to Whirlwind propellers, and armed with M240 crew-served machine guns.

Tourism

Airboat rides have become popular as an ecotourism activity in several locations including the Florida Everglades and the Louisiana bayou. A typical airboat tour lasts between 60–90 minutes and carries passengers at speeds of up to 60 miles per hour. Most tour companies employ experienced captains who are able to point out alligators and other wildlife and flora from a safe distance. Most companies promote a very high chance of seeing an alligator on their tours.

Notes

References

External links

On the propulsion of ships by air propellers
Italian racing "Idroscivolanti" of the 1930s