The French Once Built A Wild Hovering Cargo Truck That Drove On Any Surface

The truck, in all its various forms, ranging from tiny Keis to mammoth mining machines, is perhaps one of the most important motor vehicles in history, delivering all sorts of goods and people to destinations all over the world. Yet, even after over a century of development, trucks still have one major limitation: they can be stopped by rough terrain and flooded roadways, not to mention obstacles like rocks and logs that may be encountered in more extreme locales. Back in the 1960s, the French tried to develop a revolutionary truck that could carry on where other by combining a truck with hovercraft technology. The result was the Terraplane BC7 and its siblings, and rest assured, these things are wild.

The concept of the hovercraft has been around for longer than the car itself has. According to a bill submitted to the UK Parliament in 1968, one of the earliest recorded instances of an air cushion vehicle was in 1716 when Swedish philosopher and scientist Emanuel Swedenborg sketched out a theoretical surface-effect vehicle that could have hovered off of the ground using pedals and a pump. However, this idea was far too early to be practical.

Then came British engineer Sir John Thornycroft in the 1870s, who concocted the idea for an air cushion vehicle that would have reduced the drag experienced by boats by placing their hulls in a pocket of air above the water. Yet again, propulsion technology was too underdeveloped and nothing came of it. By the 1930s, engine technology had advanced enough to permit 1930s Russian aerodynamicist Vladimir Lekov to build a functional hovercraft, but this design proved to be unreliable.

The Father Of The Hovercraft

There have been several hovercraft innovators throughout history, including American inventor Walter A. Crowley, the man who tends to get the credit for creating the modern hovercraft is engineer Sir Christopher Cockerell. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology sums up his story well:

Cockerell earned an engineering degree from Cambridge University’s Peterhouse College and worked for the Radio Research Company until 1935. That year, he joined the Marconi Wireless Telegraph Company. There, he was deeply involved in developing radar systems for use during World War II. He was named on 36 patents during his tenure with Marconi and was credited with inventions, such as an aerial direction finder used by airmen during the war, as well as equipment used to pinpoint the locations of German radar stations on the northern coast of Europe, which were then bombed in preparation for the Allies’ Normandy invasion in 1944.

In 1950, Cockerell left Marconi to manage a marina that he and his wife had purchased in Norfolk, England. While living in Norfolk, he began thinking about the concept of a heavy craft that could be supported on an air cushion and skim along the surface of a body of water without the drag produced by friction. He began experimenting with vacuum cleaner tubes and empty aluminum cans and found that when placing a small can inside a larger one and blowing air through the smaller can, it hovered above the bottom surface of the larger object. By 1955, he had a working prototype and pursued a patent for his creation, which he dubbed a “hovercraft.” He obtained a patent in 1956.

That year, he demonstrated his prototype craft, which used air blown out of the bottom of the craft under pressure, to British authorities and showed that it was possible to enable such a vehicle to glide easily over water and land, even mud and marshes. Meanwhile, American Charles J. Fletcher had invented a similar device called the “Glidemobile” during WWII. His design was classified by the U.S. Department of War, which denied Fletcher the right to patent the invention. Cockerell, however, having come up with his concept all on his own and having been the first to patent, is known as the father of the hovercraft that would come to be known and used around the world.

His SR.N1 experimental vehicle proved that the hovercraft concept was sound, and it wasn’t long before the world seemingly became obsessed with hovercrafts. The largest civil hovercraft ever built was the Saunders-Roe Nautical 4 (SR.N4). This marvel of mid-1960s engineering was so huge that it carried 254 passengers and up to 30 cars in its 130-foot body. Power came from a quartet of Rolls-Royce Proteus gas turbines making 3,400 shaft horsepower each.

That was just the first SR.N4, the Mark 3 model was 185 feet long, saw its engines pumped up to 3,800 SHP each, and carried up to 418 passengers and up to 60 cars. These beasts could carry about as much weight as a jumbo jet and speed across water at 68 mph.

France’s Hovercraft Were Weirder

Hover fever was found in France, too. Perhaps the most famous French hover tech engineer was Jean Bertin, who is known best for his absurd jet-powered hovering Aérotrain. Yes, a jet-powered hovering train! It even broke speed records, but ultimately failed.

Mustard, a fantastic YouTube channel, has a great video on this vehicle:

Before Bertin obsessed over making a lightning-quick train, he flexed his muscles as an aeronautical engineer. Early in Bertin’s career in the 1940s, he worked for Société nationale d’étude et de construction de moteurs d’aviation, or SNECMA, a developer of aircraft engines. There, Bertin designed a reversing system for jet engines. The design is often credited as being the invention of the reverser that jet aircraft began using after.

In 1955, Bertin left SNECMA with a team of engineers to form Bertin & Cie. At first, Bertin just wanted to lead innovation in France. The company’s first projects were further improvements to jet engines. Then, as Le Bien Public writes, Bertin’s colleague Louis Duthion was working on an engine silencer when, by accident, he created a method for producing an air cushion. The team then slapped flexible skirts on this device, creating the fundamentals of an air cushion vehicle.

Apparently, this breakthrough would consume Bertin for the rest of his career. Bertin would work on hovercraft projects at the same time Cockerell did, but Bertin went in a different direction.

In 1962, Bertin and his team produced their first working concept for a land-based air cushion vehicle. The Terraplane BC4 was little more than just a basic cargo platform. However, through the use of conical flexible skirts and a Turbomeca Marboré II turbojet, this platform hovered above the ground, could clear obstacles a foot high, and had a carrying capacity of 1.5 metric tons.

This was the proof of concept that Bertin & Cie needed to prove that its hover technology was viable. The company used the BC4 to show how hover vehicles could be easily controlled and were stable. The BC4 was also shown off to the public, gathering interest from both the private sector and the military.

The BC4 had some serious interest behind it, but there were some glaring issues with the design. The first was that, as you can probably guess, turbojets are screaming loud and have a terrifying thirst for fuel. Oh, and if built, the BC4 would have also been wildly expensive. That wasn’t going to work in a production design.

Thus, Bertin & Cie began exploring different propulsion methods. Next, the team decided to look into piston engines driving fans. In theory, a piston engine would knock out most of those problems as they’re more fuel efficient, quieter, and cheaper than turbojets. In 1963, Bertin & Cie appeared at the Paris Air Show with its latest experimental vehicle, the Terraplane BC6.

Add Wheels

This hovercraft represented not just refinements to the concept presented in the BC4, but the vehicle finally took on a real shape. Bertin & Cie imagined a futuristic hovering cargo truck. In theory, this new design meant that Bertin’s truck couldn’t be stopped by destroyed roads, deep snow, or even large bodies of water in its path. It was a truck that could go almost anywhere.

Lifting power came from two Porsche Type 616 1.6-liter flat fours punching out 90 HP each. The BC6 also brought back the eight flexible skirts, but now they had centrifugal fans above them that were driven by shafts from the two boxer engines.

Bertin & Cie produced one 3.5-ton BC6, but made two variations of it, one that carried cargo and the other, which had a canopy for passengers. Both models featured a single wheel up front and another wheel in the rear. That rear wheel was powered and helped provide forward momentum while on land, while the front wheel helped steer the rig on land. Operations over water or ice would have relied mostly on steering by tilting the air cushion bags. This navigation was carried out through a combination of turning a steering wheel and dragging a long lever that sprouted out of the steering wheel. It’s noted that pulling the long lever tilted all eight cushions at once, allowing the truck to crab walk.

Reportedly, the Porsche engines weren’t the only outsourced equipment onboard. A 50 HP to 65 HP Panhard engine drove the rear wheel, Hispano-Suiza made the shafts that connected the Porsche engines to the fans, and the gearbox for the rear drive wheel was provided by Peugeot. The BC6 even had a brake in the rear wheel.

The public showing of the BC6 was followed up with an announcement from Bertin & Cie that there could have been an entire Terraplane line. The company figured that the smallest Terraplane would have 197 HP and carry 2,755 pounds, while the largest would have 640 HP and carry 21,165 pounds.

The Terraplane experimental vehicles were impressive enough for French aviation firm Sud Aviation to take up an interest with an option to buy. Bertin saw the potential deal with Sud Aviation as its path to making the Terraplanes real.

The Hover Truck

In 1965, Jean Bertin founded Société d’étude et de développement des aéroglisseurs marins (SEDAM) in collaboration with other French companies in an effort to further develop hovercraft.

One of these developments was taking the Terraplane project to the conclusion it was already floating toward. The BC6 further proved the viability of a hover truck, but using only two wheels presented some issues. One problem was that having just two wheels meant that the truck’s air cushions had to be running at all times, even when the truck “drove” down a road. A secondary problem caused by the two wheels was that the Terraplane BC6, despite having marketing materials showing a possible bus version, just wasn’t a practical vehicle to be used on a road, anyway.

In 1966, Bertin rolled out the apex of his hovercraft truck development, the Terraplane BC7 “track truck.” This vehicle was designed to combine the best of a regular truck with the benefits of hovercraft.

The biggest change to the Terraplane BC7 came in its entire propulsion configuration. All other previous iterations depended on the air cushion bags to support the truck. This time, the truck had four wheels equipped with road tires. When the truck was on land and wasn’t going over rough terrain, the hover system was switched off and the tires held all of the truck’s 5,511 pounds of empty weight and up to 2.5 tons of cargo or passengers.

Adding the two wheels brought several advantages. Now the truck could actually drive on the road. Likewise, not having to run the cushion system all of the time meant fuel savings for the operator. The wheels of the BC6 weren’t even designed to carry weight.

Other changes were made to the air cushion system. Two cushions were added, one in front and one in the rear, for a total of 10. When these cushions were activated, they could have been used to soften bumps from rough roads, help the truck support more weight, and, of course, they also had the ability to lift the tires off of the ground, allowing the truck to glide over extreme terrain or even to traverse bodies of water.

Bertin even simplified how the truck maneuvers in the water. Instead of tilting the cushion bags, the wheels had paddles built into them. Forward momentum was achieved by just spinning the wheels in the water. Steering was achieved by turning the wheels in the water.

One party trick offered by the air cushion system was that an operator could pump the cushions up and then perform a U-turn in the truck’s own length. Check out this video:

French Terraplane BC7 hovertruck prototype designed by Bertin & Cie in 1966 pic.twitter.com/kYWNk2ocxv

— hw97karbine (@hw97karbine) May 16, 2025

Reporting seems to vary about onboard engines. One source says that a single 140 HP diesel engine drove all four wheels and the air cushion fans. Another source claims the 140 HP diesel powered only the cushions, while two 45 HP engines drove the wheels. Supposedly, the engines each powered an axle. In theory, this meant that the operator could have front wheel drive, four wheel drive, or rear wheel drive in addition to hovering.

As you might expect with only that morsel of power, the Terraplane BC7 wasn’t fast. Its top speed was around 30 mph on land but only around 6 mph on water. Still, this one also got interest. Transport Canada, SNC, and Bombardier all wanted a look at this one. SEDAM also took over the Terraplane project and built one more hover truck based on the BC7, but in a smaller form factor.

A Dead End, Sort Of

Bertin also built the BC8 in 1966. This was the direct successor to the BC4, and like that hovercraft, it didn’t have wheels and used a turbojet. The idea behind the BC8 was that it could have served airfields surrounded by rough terrain.

Ultimately, Bertin’s Terraplane project failed to reach production. Sud Aviation pulled its interest, and Canada eventually did as well. Bertin was left without any takers for his wild hover truck. But not all was lost. SEDAM would go on to create its Naviplane series of hovercraft, which saw great success in the 1970s. Sadly, SEDAM still ended up closing its doors in 1982. It’s believed that the Terraplane experimental vehicles were scrapped in the 1980s.

The Terraplanes were built during a time when it seemed everyone was obsessed with the promise of hovering just a little bit over the ground and water. The BC7, in particular, seemed to be the truck of the future. Here was a vehicle unbothered by rough roads or water, yet Bertin didn’t find any takers. I could see why. The Terraplane was a slow truck and an even slower boat with lots of complexity added. Still, it’s so awesome that something like this even existed, if only for a blip in history.