LCVP (Higgins boat)

The LCVP, the Landing Craft, Vehicle, Personnel, better known as the Higgins boat, was a landing craft that the Allied forces used extensively in amphibious landings in the Second World War. Typically built of plywood, this shallow-draft, barge-like boat could ferry a platoon-sized group of about 36 men to shore at 12 knots, who climbed down a cargo net from their transport and left by charging down the lowered bow ramp. It was just over 36 feet long and just under 11 feet wide, and was powered by a 225-horsepower Gray Marine 6-71 diesel engine, although the Hudson Invader gasoline engine, a Hall-Scott design built under license, went into a minority of them when the diesel was not available. It went into production in April 1943, replacing the LCP(R), and 23,358 were built; 1,089 were used by US forces on D-Day. Andrew Higgins of New Orleans designed it from his Eureka boat, and Dwight Eisenhower said that without Higgins and his LCVPs the whole strategy of the war would have been different. Its plywood sides left it vulnerable to heavier enemy fire, and extremely shallow water or hard obstructions such as reefs could stop it.