Tom Vosner - Inside Cocaine Wars: Drug Speedboats TV -Tom Stoppard - Shakespeare in Love 1998 - Mark Williams TV - Ronald Top TV - Rory McGrath - William Cory - Kenneth Grahame - J B Priestley - Marchioness: Party Boat Disaster TV - Werner Herzog - Stephen Redgrave - The African Queen 1951 - Monty Python’s Flying Circus TV - Sporting Greats TV - Sacha Baron Cohen: Who is America? TV - A Very British History TV - Curse of the Bermuda Triangle TV - Faking It TV - The Thames at Night with Tony Robinson TV -
The problem with a 450-foot boat made of wood is that the wood as the material cannot maintain the shape of the boat, and the boat would start to distort at sea, seams would open up and it would sink. Tom Vosner, marine archaeologist
A sleek super-charged speedboat streaks across the Caribbean on a tropical night. A staggering two tons ... of pure Colombian cocaine is crammed in the hull. Inside Cocaine Wars II: Drug Speedboats, National Geographic 2012
At least eight out of ten boats make it through. ibid.
Rosencrantz: We might as well be dead. Do you think death could possibly be a boat?
Guildenstern: No, no, no ... Death is ... not. Death isn’t. You take my meaning. Death is the ultimate negative. Not-being. You can’t not-be on a boat.
Rosencrantz: I’ve frequently not been on boats.
Guildenstern: No, no, no – what you’ve been is not on boats. Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead
I had that Christopher Marlowe in my boat once. Shakespeare in Love 1998 starring Gwyneth Paltrow & Joseph Fiennes & Geoffrey Rush & Colin Firth & Ben Affleck & Judi Dench & Simon Callow & Jim Carter & Martin Clunes et al, director John Madden, Boatman to Shakespeare
Brindley had some serious problems to overcome ... It was an extraordinary feat of engineering. And it took great courage and huge bravado to even conceive of doing this: the newspapers called it the Eighth Wonder of the World ... His extraordinary tunnel is now disused. Mark Williams, Industrial Revelations s1e3: Clocking On, Discovery 2002
Because he’d already set the dimensions of the tunnel at seven feet wide all boats now on this system are the dimensions of this working boat, about seventy by seven, a ratio of ten to one: a narrow-boat. ibid.
In 1775 Perrier launched the very first steam-powered boat on the River Seine in Paris. Ronald Top, Industrial Revelations: The European Story s3e8: Steam on the Water, Discovery 2005
Once paddle-steamers had proved to be a commercial success in the United States they quickly spread across Europe. ibid.
Ericsson had developed a shortened version of the Archimedes’ Screw that would propel boats. ibid.
Paddle-steamers were not designed for tourists. They were cargo ships ... A hundred and fifty years after they first appeared paddle-steamers are still one of the best ways of exploring the alpine landscape. Ronald Top, More Industrial Revelations s4e9: Europe – Steaming up the Alps, Discovery 2006
This is it: the world’s first fast-slipway lifeboat. (Ship & Boat) Rory McGrath’s Industrial Revelations s5e5: Best of British Engineering: Ships, Discovery 2008
Jolly boating weather,
And a hay harvest breeze,
Blade on the feather,
Shade off the trees
Swing, swing together
With your body between your knees. William Cory, Eton Boating Song
There is nothing – absolutely nothing – half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats. Kenneth Grahame, The Wind in the Willows
The little steamer, like all her brave and battered sisters, is immortal. She’ll go sailing proudly down the years in the epic of Dunkirk. And our great-grand-children, when they learn how we began this war by snatching glory out of defeat, and then swept on to victory, may also learn how the little holiday steamers made an excursion to hell and came back glorious. J B Priestley, radio broadcast 5th June 1940
Within thirty minutes the boat will be run down by larger vessel, and fifty-one young people will die needlessly. The sinking of the Marchioness was the UK’s worst river disaster in over fifty years. Marchioness: Party Boat Disaster, Channnel 5 2014
For centuries there had been accidents on the River. ibid.
The Bowbelle struck The Marchioness from behind. ibid.
Every man should pull a boat over a mountain once in his life. Werner Herzog
1996: If anyone sees me go anywhere near a boat you’ve got my permission to shoot me. Stephen Redgrave
Now that I’ve had a taste of it, no wonder you love boating, Mr Allnut. The African Queen 1951 starring Humphrey Bogart & Katharine Hepburn & Robert Morley & Peter Bull & Theodore Bikel & Walter Gotell & Peter Swanwick & Richard Marner et al, director John Huston
Here we are, going down the river like Antony & Cleopatra in that barge. ibid.
This isn’t a lifeboat, dear. It’s 24 Parker Street. Monty Python’s Flying Circus s3e7: Salad Days, BBC 1973
An Olympic Legend: Winner of Five Consecutive Olympic Rowing Gold Medals 1984 1988 1992 1996 2000. Sporting Greats: Steve Redgrave, plaque, Sky Sports 2017
It is much better you deal with me than with Assad. So let’s talk about the security of the boat. Sacha Baron Cohen: Who is America? IV, Gio the billionaire to yacht dealer, Channel 4 2018
Officials here this week reckon that only 40% of the people who set out from Vietnam by boat to reach Hong Kong ever make it. A Very British History s2e4: Whatever Happened to the Boat People? BBC 2020
40 years ago the world knew them as the Boat People – refugees who’d fled Vietnam. Some found safety in Britain. But scattered around the country, focusing on their future not their past, the new community became almost invisible. ibid.
Ghost ships: Ships that are inexplicably floating around without crews in the Bermuda Triangle … What would make a person just get off of their boat? Or, who took them off the boat? Curse of the Bermuda Triangle VIII: Ghost Ship Terror, Discovery 2021
The speedboat killer: the victim just 24, the boat owner determined to escape punishment. He claims to be innocent. But does his story add up? Faking It: Tears of a Crime s5e3: The Speedboat Killer, Discovery 2021
2015: A speedboat owners gets ready to take his new day on a sightseeing tour. His name Jack Shepherd. ibid.
On her cameraphone Charlotte can be heard commenting on the speed. ibid.
The Thames Clippers boats run in continuous loops from Putney in the west to Woolwich in the east. The Thames at Night with Tony Robinson III, Channel 5 2021