its beaching capacity was good. By 1930, three MLC were operated by the Royal Navy. Early MLCs were powered by single Hotchkiss petrol engines. Later craft were powered by single Gill petrol engines. Service history At the outbreak of the Second World War, six MLCs were based in Britain and three more were with British forces in Malta. Norwegian Campaign On 29 April 1940, in the Norwegian Campaign, three MLCs accompanied a Landing Craft Mechanised Mk 1 (LCM) Mark I and four Landing Craft Assault (LCA)s to the Narvik area. Shortly afterwards, two more MLCs arrived. In early May, one of the first tasks accomplished by an MLC was landing French 75mm guns to support Chasseurs in the Gratangen area. At Hol, on or about 11 May, one MLC sank due to a loading accident when a 13-ton Hotchkiss H39 tank drove off a jetty directly into the cargo well. Both went to the bottom. The first use of British landing craft in the Second World War, in an opposed landing, saw the disembarkation of French Foreign Legionnaires of the 13th Demi-Brigade (13e DBLE) and supporting French Hotchkiss H39 tanks on the beach at Bjerkvik, eight miles (13 km) above Narvik, on 13 May during the Norwegian campaign. The army commander, Général de brigade Antoine Béthouart, responsible for capturing the area north of Rombaksfjorden, realized that a landing behind German lines, in Herjangsfjorden, a part of Ofotfjorden north of Narvik was required to force the enemy to retire. The plan agreed involved a pre-landing naval bombardment, followed by the landing of three tanks - two from MLCs, and one from the new LCM(1), then the landing of an initial wave of infantry from LCAs, and lastly a follow-on force carried in barges and towed by motor torpedo boats. On 12 May, at about 23:40, Royal Navy destroyers commenced a bombardment of the town intending to destroy all buildings on the foreshore. The plan became somewhat frustrated by the slow deployment of the MLCs (and their tank cargoes), from the davits of the battleship Resolution, then serving as their transport ship. The LCAs landed after the LCM(1) had delivered a tank to the beach. The LCA crews manoeuvred their craft in the small hamlet to the vest of the village of Bjerkvik, the intended landing place, and under a slight rise in the ground in order to spare the soldiers casualties