Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, January 16, 1995 TAG: 9501170090
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: Medium
Eighteen LACV-30s were loaded aboard a barge at Little Creek over the weekend for the trip.
The Alaska state government plans to use the vehicles to reach remote areas where routes frequently are blocked by rain, snow, sleet and hail, said John Barkett, director of Norfolk operations for Textron Marine and Land Systems, a subsidiary of the company that built the hovercrafts.
``When we think of mail, we think about letters. But up there, mail is food and fuel as well,'' Barkett said.
LACVs ride a 4-foot cushion of air over water or land with up to 30 tons of cargo. Powered by two gas turbine engines, they can travel at more than 50 mph for up to nine hours.
But because they burn an expensive 260 gallons of standard aviation kerosene an hour, Army officials retired the vehicles. They had operated out of Fort Story for 14 years.
LACVs originally were designed to supply forces planning large-scale military operations in regions without developed ports.
The vehicles were categorized as surplus and transferred to Alaska at no cost. The Army paid $5.8 million per hovercraft when it first started buying them in 1979.
Alaska officials have formed a joint venture with a company owned by Native Americans to operate the craft, Barkett said. That company will contract with Alaska to make mail and other deliveries.
The state's half-million people occupy an area about twice the size of Texas.
Although air-cushioned craft have been used commercially in Europe and Asia, the idea has not yet caught on in the United States, Barkett said.
by CNB