page_title: Ground-effect vehicle
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Ground-effect vehicle / History
caption_attribution_description: English: An artist's concept of a Soviet wing-in-ground effect vehicle (hand sketched illustration)
context_page_description: A ground-effect vehicle, also called a wing-in-ground-effect, ground-effect craft, wingship, flarecraft or ekranoplan, is a vehicle that is designed to attain sustained flight over a level surface by making use of ground effect, the aerodynamic interaction between the wings and the surface. The type is typically intended to operate from water like a flying boat, but some can operate over any flat area such as frozen lakes or flat plains similar to a hovercraft.
context_section_description: 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 surface 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 ..."
  By the 1960s, the technology started maturing, 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 remains noticeable in most GEVs seen today.
caption: Artist's concept of a Lun-class ekranoplan in flight
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