READERS' STORIES

Comments from Mike Youngson

Dear Dan,
Thanks for contacting Chip on my behalf, it looks like he will be able to help me out on what seems to be a very tricky subject. I have just replied to him and will eagerly await his response!!. With regards to some of your questions i know the location of a further two "nasty's". The first has had approx £350,000ST spent on it!!!!!!!.This is no tall story as i spoke to the man himself, a welshman now living in Malta with his luxury motor yacht that once was KMN" LOM" P347 renamed "Welsh Princess". The second is KNM"JO" P346 renamed "Four Acres" and is lying approx 1/2KM up river from me (i am at the lower end of the river Itchen at the mouth of the Channel) this particular boat has been converted into a house boat and is for sale for a very expensive price i think anyway of £65 000ST,so your friend Dave Clark would probably collapse at these prices but thats boats for you!! In reference to the photographs i will gladly send photographs of "SKARV" and what we have done so far,and out of interest will include a rather tatty picture of "LOM" and her £350 000 facelift!!! If anyone you know has any good photographs of "nastys" in action i would love to arrange some way of getting a copy to frame,just so i can remember what she must have been like flying along at 45KNTS.I can't imagine a more inpressive sight than 70 tons of boat hurtling through the water!!!!! I hope in the future i can be of some service to you,please do not hesitate to ask for any help.At the moment i am a serving member of HM Royal Marines Special Boat Squadron and have access to a lot of information both up to date and historical on British Landing Craft if this subject ever comes up in conversation and someone needs a question answered or a drawing\photograph then i will certainly be of some help.

Semper Fi,
Mike Youngson

Dear Dan,
My name is Mike Youngson and i live in Southampton, U.K. I recently visited your website and ever since have been meaning to contact you. My reasons are two-fold really and very one sided, I own the Norwegian built MTB "SKARV" 1960 Batservis, Mandal, and I am looking for it's history military or otherwise. I have exhausted all avenues here including libraries, historians, and naval experts but no one seems to have much info. The second reason is tied to the first and is that i must sell her and would like the new owner to have as much information as possible on her as she is such a lovely boat that has seen some hard times and had been left to rot up until i bought her three years ago. I have done all the work myself so progress has been VERY slow but we have now lane a completely new deck and wheelhouse. She will never regretfully be back to her former glory but i have tried to salvage what I can, I'm afraid there has been a butcher onboard who has been very unsympathetic to her original layout. Anyway back to the initial request, I hope that you can be of some help, if your web page is anything to go by I'm sure you will shed some light on the subject.

Semper Fi,
Mike Youngson.