Where Are All the Airships?

You can see Hanger One from Highway 101 as you come to the southern tip of San Francisco Bay. It dwarfs NASA’s Moffett Field, and the closer you get, the more massive it appears.

The giant domed structure, now being leased by Google and in the process of being restored, is an artifact of a bygone era. Its unique shape and massive interior weren’t designed for fighter jets or missiles, they were intended for airships. (READ MORE: Avoid Death by Turbulence: Fasten Your Seat Belts Until Landing!)

It’s somewhat hard to imagine a world where people were interested in flying in anything other than planes. But in the early days of rickety aircraft, when flying was a risky endeavor done by men who had just left boyhood and were still cultivating an addiction to adrenalin, the sedated pace of massive blimp seemed like a good way to commercialize flight.

There were, of course, a whole host of problems to address. For one, airships couldn’t hold a large group of passengers efficiently. They required massive hangers (hence Hanger One in San Francisco) that were more than a little challenging to build. (READ MORE: Gentlemen, Scholars, Thugs: The Real Heroes Behind The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare)

But the insurmountable design flaw was that the airships stayed afloat because they were filled with hydrogen. The gas is relatively harmless until it catches fire. Just one spark would turn the whole contraption into a floating bomb — which is exactly what happened on May 6, 1937, in Lakehurst, New Jersey.

The Hindenburg sought to solve the passenger problem by being the largest airship ever built. Built by German engineers, the Zepplin had a light metal frame intended to protect the gas interior and held 36 passengers and 61 crew members. Like its smaller and more famous older brother, the Graf Zepplin, the Hindenburg, was built to float over oceans.

On May 3, the airship left its home in Frankfurt, Germany, and set off for Lakehurst’s Navy Air Base. The trip was uneventful and looked like it would be a success. Then, as the Zepplin touched the mooring, a single spark ignited the hydrogen cavity. (READ MORE from Aubrey Gulick: Don’t Be a Dictator If You Want a Happy Death)

It was all over in a matter of seconds. The hull incinerated, leaving the passenger and crew falling 200 feet. The disaster killed 13 passengers, 21 crewmen, and 1 member of the ground crew standing below, leaving the survivors with crippling injuries.

It simultaneously destroyed any hope that the dirigible would become the way to travel around the globe — a fate that became sealed just two years later when B-314 crossed the Atlantic carrying 22 passengers without bursting into flames upon reaching its destination. By the end of the World War II, the airship’s fate was sealed. Not a single Zepplin had survived the war, and the hangers that were once built for them were left standing empty — a reminder that not all new technology is good technology.

This article originally appeared on Aubrey’s Substack, Pilgrim’s Way on May 6, 2024.

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