Built as No 27 as one of the Winchester class SR.N6 Hovercraft by the British Hovercraft Corporation, Cowes, Isle of Wight for the Royal Navy.
Displacement 10.9 tons, dim. 17.78 x 7.97 x 6.32m (height on cushion.)
One Roll-Royce Gnome turbine engine 1,050 hp for lift and propulsion driving single four bladed variable pitch propeller, speed 50 knots.
Range by a speed of 30 knots, 170 miles.
Capacity for 58 passengers.
Crew 3.
SR.N6 Hovercraft serial No XV859 made on 11 May 1967 her first engine run.
06 June 1967 was she delivered to the Royal Naval Aircraft Yard at Fleetlands, Gosport, where some modifications were made to make her suitable for military use.
15 September 1967 commissioned.
01 October 1967 she was loaded on the Falkland Island chartered A.E.S. at Portsmouth and shipped to the Falklands where she arrived on 21 October 1967.
There she was crewed by three officers and 10 ratings of the Naval Party 8902, which had been formed to asses the suitability of the hovercraft in the Royal Navy in a support roll, and the Falkland Islands being an ideal environment for such an assessment.
02 November 1967 she was operational and made she the first voyage from Port Stanley to the small settlement Green Patch in the Berkeley Sound a little more to the north of Port Stanley, during the voyage she carried the mail to Green Patch.
For more as 5 years she was in service in the Falkland Islands, she made two circumnavigational cruises around the group.
May 1972 she had an accident in which she severely was damaged, and was shipped back to the United Kingdom. She was not replaced in the Falklands.
After repair and refit she was transferred to the Interservice Hovercraft Unit (IHU) on 8 May 1974.
13 and 14 August 1976 she appears at the Hovershow 76.
1 January 1977 IHU was replaced by the Naval Hovercraft Trails Unit and she was with this unit at its formation.
January 1978 used for bomb disposal duties off the coast of ESSEX.
30 June 1978 she was at the Hovershow 78.
November 1985 she had operated for 4121 hours.
1985 was she acquired by Hoverwork.
08 January 1989 she was transferred to Hovercraft Espana and shipped to Estapona, Spain, via Poole, Cherbourg, Erun and Madrid where she would be used in a service from Estapona to La Linea de la Concepcion on the Costa del Sol.
How long she was used in this service I could not find but she was destroyed (scrapped) before 2011.
Falkland Islands 2001 37p sg?, scott?
Source: http://www.btinternet.com/~mark.e.porter/027.html Gibbons Stamp Monthly July 2005. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SR.N6 http://www.hovercraft-museum.org/craft.html