Some history
Tornado Boats was started in 1975 by David Haygreen.
One of the early pioneers in the development of the RIB, David, an
ex professional diver and aircraft engineer wanted a boat for his
Marine Survey company and, with nothing commercially suitable,
decided to build his own. The result a 5.5m boat was a great
success and powered by a 50HP motor (big at the time !) attracted
much interest. Constantly asked by others where they could get one
David was at first reluctant to build more. Fortunately his passion
for design and a love of the sea won through and the decision was
made to develop a production boat. A name was required, and with a
copy deadline for the first advert but an hour away the name
Tornado came to mind.
The Tornado was born.
The first!
The first Tornado, a 5m, featured the simple logo of a round circle
with a 'T' inside. Amazingly some of these boats still exist –
30 years on !
Production began slowly with one boat being built every three to
four weeks. Manufacture was done from home with the hulls laminated
in the garage, and the tubes assembled on plywood sheets laid
across the bed – those were the days !
Slowly the Tornado's reputation for strength and performance grew
and an invitation to trial a boat for the British Navy was
received. A trial which the Tornado won. The result a production
run of over 140 boats and a move to a new factory in Hull !
Moving the production to China
Never truly interested in mass production, David continued to grow
the business concentrating more on development and innovation with
the custom building of boats. Searching for quality in performance
and build. Such dictates came at a price with demand constantly
exceeding supply and delivery dates too long for many to wait. The
decision was made in 2005 to move production to China – 'the
workshop of the World'. Skilled labour was more plentiful and the
cost savings could be put back into speeding up production,
developing new models and raising the quality of the materials used
in the construction (superior resins being one example ... see
build and construction).
With the business growing at such an exponential rate, David
realised that the company needed someone else to help run the day
to day business..
In 2008 he was joined by Lars Hjorth the Danish dealer for Tornado
Boats and the head-office was moved to Aarhus in Denmark. Together
the new management team are re-energising Tornado to ensure the
successes of the past are partnered with new ideas for the future.
