NEARLY a century after zeppelins were largely abandoned, a handful of start-ups are trying to revive the airship for both cargo and passenger flights.
Blimps are the biggest aircraft to ever take to the skies.
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But the tragic Hindenburg disaster in 1937, which claimed the lives of 35 people when the blimp exploded into flames, had brought the airship industry to its knees.
New zeppelins would be much safer, according to the companies wanting to rebuild the industry.
Pathfinder 1
Billionaire Google co-founder, Sergey Brin, is just one of the people trying to bring back the airship.
Brin’s company LTA Research has created a 400ft “lighter than air” blimp-like vehicle – dubbed Pathfinder 1 – which received airworthiness approval in late 2023.
It has been green lit to fly no higher than 1,500ft.
The blimp reached another milestone in October last year – its first untethered outdoor flight.
Brin wants to turn these sky-giants into fuel-efficient cargo vessels.
The Pathfinder 1 will use only non-flammable helium, as opposed to explosive hydrogen, making it cheaper to fly than planes, fuel-wise.
These airships could one day carry up to 200 tons of cargo each, LTA CEO Alan Weston previously told Bloomberg.
That is nearly ten times the amount a Boeing 737 can carry.
Airships don’t need a runway, enabling Brin to make his Pathfinder 1 something of a humanitarian project too.
The airship aims to be incredibly light but with a lot of space for cargo, making it an efficient means of delivering large amounts of aid and relief workers to difficult-to-access disaster zones.
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What happened to the Hindenberg?
On the second of its scheduled 1937 transatlantic crossings, the Hindenburg burst into flames over Lakehurst, New Jersey.
While the blimp was designed to be filled with helium, it was filled with hydrogen instead.
This was due to US export restrictions on helium at the time.
Hydrogen is extremely flammable.
The official cause of the fire was due to a “discharge of atmospheric electricity” near a gas leak on the ship’s surface, according to History.com.
The incident killed 35 out of 96 passengers and one member of ground crew.
A reflexive fear of hydrogen based vehicles began to spread among the public, in what has come to be known as ‘Hindenburg syndrome’, which largely brought an end to airship travel.
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‘The flying bum’
The 320ft Airlander 10, from UK-based Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV), is part airship, part aeroplane.
Dubbed ‘the flying bum’ due to its unique shape, the Airlander 10 is expected to fly roughly 1,000 feet over cities.
From 2030, the company behind the project hopes to build two dozen airships per year from its factory in Doncaster, South Yorkshire.
HAV is hoping to revolutionise regional air travel with its airship.
For short plane journeys run by regional airlines, the costs of operation using an Airlander “are at or below the cost of what they’re operating today” with smaller passenger planes, HAV boss Tom Grundy has said previously.
Like Pathfinder 1, the Airlander will not need miles of tarmac runway far from city centres.
“It doesn’t have to be stuck to going between today’s airports,” according to Grundy.
“It can go into different places. And yet it’s faster than moving around the world over the surface.
“It’s faster than those ferry journeys. It can often be faster than a train journey, very often faster than a car journey. So providing this middle option.”
Airlander 10 has already seen commercial interest.
European regional airline Air Nostrum has said it will buy 20 Airlanders to carry passengers between Mediterranean islands.
Luxury tour company Grands Espaces also wants the aircraft to take ferry passengers over the Arctic.
With airships, weight is the key concern rather than volume – unlike planes.
Although this should mean there are more spacious seats for passengers, while luxury high-flyers could even each have double bedrooms.
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Flying Whales
France-based firm Flying Whales, backed by the French government, is working on a separate 656ft-long rigid airship known as the LCA60T.
Designed for heavy load transport, the LCA60T will have a carrying capacity of 60 tons.
Flying Whales raised €122million (£103million) to fund the project in 2022.
It will bound through the skies on helium, in combination with hydrogen fuel cells to cut CO2 emissions.
