By Claire Bates, Original remarks reported and published in the Daily Mail
UPDATED: 09:00 EST, 25 June 2012 : BLOG Editor's comments in RED, 10 October 2012
More than 70 years (actually, 75 years) after the Hindenburg disaster ended the golden airship era, giant blimps will take to the skies again with the launch of the world's largest inflatable craft. See : U.S. Navy, which never gave up on using them. ... neither did the Germans, nor the Swiss, nor the Canadians nor the Russians !
The pioneering Bullet 580 is a 235 ft. long and 65 ft in diameter airship that can lift payloads of 2,000 lbs up to 20,000 feet in the air.
It was inflated this week inside the Garret Coliseum in Alabama - one of the few facilities large enough to host the ship. The process took the developers at E-Green Technologies just over six hours.
The model 580 Bullet airship is 230 ft. in length and covered with a thin material that is 10 times stronger than steel.
The $8,800,000 (£5.5million) craft can be flown remotely or with a crew. The company plan to build a fleet of hire vehicles (leased airships) that they will rent out for between $320,000 (£200,000) and $880,000 (£550,000) a month.
Chief Executive of E-Green Technologies, Mike Lawson, said: 'It's slow enough to be used for sightseeing, large enough to carry heavy cargo and enough volume of lifting capability to be flied (flown?!) at 20,000 feet unmanned. So you have a gift of all different technologies.'
Lift is provided by a system of seven bags filled with helium, while the inner hull is full of ambient air. Hydrogen was used in the 1920s and 1930s because helium was considered too expensive at the time and still is, the price point for helium being currently 12 times the cost of hydrogen; in addition, helium is scarce, expensive, and difficult to extract and purify . Hydrogen can be made by breaking down water into its constituent molecules of hydrogen and oxygen, both useful substances, by the use, of e.g., Concentrated Solar Power OR the hydrolysis of water using on-site generation of electricity by, e.g., wave or wind power.
How the Bullet will look in the air. The blimp will run on ALGAE FUEL --- how difficult is that to obtain ?? ... how expensive ??? Are we missing something important in this supply chain ???
The airship will cruise at a speed of 35 m.p.h. , which will allow plenty of time for sightseeing for any passengers.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF AIRSHIPS, WHICH WE CERTAINLY NEED, AS THERE AREN'T ENOUGH NEGATIVE HISTORIES PUBLISHED (Yes, we're being sarcastic!)
In 1852 the French engineer Henri Giffard made the first engine-powered flight in a steam-powered airship. A year later the American, Dr. Solomon Andrews, created the first lighter-than- air airship. He flew one over New York city in 1865. The first fully controllable airship flight was made in 1884. The 170 foot airship La France covered 5 miles in 23 minutes with an electric motor.
The first Zeppelin was launched in 1900. These had a rigid skeleton and passenger compartment.
During WW I the Germans, French and Italians operated airships but they were abandoned by 1917 due to unreliability. Britain developed the R33 and R34 rigid airships, which flew from 1919.
The R34 was the first to make an east-to-west Atlantic crossing.
Another desperately-needed photograph of the Hindenburg disaster was inserted here and removed by Editor
In 1929 the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin made the first round-the-world flight. British journalist Grace Marguerite, Lady Hay Drummond-Hay was on board and became the first woman to circumnavigate the world by air.
Another desperately-needed photograph of the Hindenburg disaster was inserted here and removed by Editor
In 1929 the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin made the first round-the-world flight. British journalist Grace Marguerite, Lady Hay Drummond-Hay was on board and became the first woman to circumnavigate the world by air.
Airships were poorly equipped to deal with adverse weather and crashes and fatalities were common. ... rather like writing a consumer review of a 2013 automobile by road testing 1914 Fords.
By the mid-1930s Germany was the only country pursuing airships. The Hindenburg disaster in 1937, which killed 37 people was the death knell. Why doesn't this article mention the Navy blimps that flew bravely --- and apparently unsung --- in all conditions to keep the menace of the Nazi U-boats from our Atlantic shores. Not one single merchant ship escorted by blimps was lost to German submarines . All this does not even mention the many search-and-rescue missions flown by Navy blimps bringing comfort and assistance to torpedoed sailors adrift in the ocean.
The U.S used airships during WW2 for military purposes but post-war they have mainly been restricted to advertising and Intelligence and reconnaissance missions too numerous to recite.
The payloads are carried inside the outer envelope of the balloon, which is only one sixteenth of an inch thick yet 10 times stronger than steel. It is made from a type of Kevlar, which is the tough material used to make bulletproof vests. Mr Lawson, said: 'If you hit a hard landing, the airship is just going to kind of bounce.'
Although the airship only has a top speed of 80 MPH it can take-off and land vertically. The craft is also able to hover over an area for up to a week at a time - something neither airplanes nor satellites nor helicopters can manage.
The craft could therefore keep a close watch on oil spills like the one in the Gulf of Mexico or monitor pirates off the coast of Somalia.
It could also serve as a near space satellite for broadcast communications, missile defense warnings, weather monitoring and geophysical surveys.
In fact its first mission will be to measure moisture content in soil. It is planned for later this year, will be a joint project of NASA and Old Dominion University. Mr. Lawson said he was confident that airships had a future in the 21st century, despite their bad press in the past.
Ed. Note : Only one airship had BAD PRESS, back in 1937; it seems to be the only tune that the Media orchestra can play. Only 36 casualties, and that appears to be the only voyage or mission that the Media remember; that one used hydrogen for the lifting gas , and flew into a strong electrical storm, which I believe they were warned about, but wanted to get down to the ground at Lakehurst, New Jersey, for the publicity and impatient passengers. Duh ! Think of all the impatient passengers that sleep on the floor of airline terminals during a snow storm. Personal observation .
His business acquired '21st Century Airships' in November 2009, which was one of the world's leading airship research and development companies.
The merged firm has already built and flown 14 prototypes, but the Bullet is their first commercial craft.
'Airships have undergone surprisingly little evolution throughout their more than 150-year history, and this is what makes our E-Green proprietary designs so desirable to government and commercial customers,' he said. I suppose that the reporter has performed little research into the many types of HYBRID designs .... NOR has she read her own description (above) of the newly developed materials of which airship envelopes are constructed, NOR has she heard of KORT nozzles, or cycloidal propellers, or ducted fans, or swivel mounts, or the remotely operated airplane drones flown over Afghanistan by pilots comfortably seated in Tampa, Florida.
'Our airships are radically different designs that move beyond the performance limitations of traditional blimps or zeppelins by combing advanced technology with simple construction and the ability to fuel with algae, protecting our environment.'
Algae is the latest biofuel exciting scientists. It draws carbon dioxide from the atmosphere when it grows and when the derived fuel is burned this same CO2 is released, making the fuel theoretically zero-carbon. Algae farms can also be created using brackish and waste water or, one could use HYDROGEN as fuel, feed it into a fuel cell (what's that?) and release nothing but water vapor into the air. Hydrogen is dangerous say Hindenburg-photograph-conscious perplexed readers ? We'll bet they drove to their office this morning in an automobile carrying a fuel tank of, say, 15 gallons of petroleum product --- one of the most explosive fuels available . OR perhaps they flew to their last vacation in a 747 , passenger jet, which flies at 35,000 feet (with no way of escape) with its fuel tank full of 48,445 U.S. gallons (183,380 liters) highly flammable jet fuel .
AMTRAK, anyone ?
The Bullet also has a Water Condensate Recovery System, which reduces the need for helium replenishment. Explanation needed here !!
The Bullet's first test flights are planned for this summer and the ship will be piloted by Captain Allan Judd who has been at the helm of smaller airships since 1986.
For those thousands of journalists who seem to have missed our compilation of civilian uses of airships the first time, here is our list, apparently not-yet-as-famous as Lady GAGA :
Non-military Applications for LTA Airships for which Remotely Operated Airships Can Provide Safe & Suitable Service
1. Sporting event video coverage2. Law enforcement: traffic, aerial views of traffic accidents;
3. Marine mammal population census, migration patterns
4. Design-and-Build surveys for planning & construction of bridges & roads
5. Marine biology --- spotting red tides in coastal waters; monitoring the health of coral reefs
6. Fire fighting --- first-on-scene situation assessment in high rise fires, inaccessible areas, or involving hazardous materials
7. News organizations --- parades, ceremonies, sporting events, and in situations where danger to the news crew is possible (Think "Arab Spring" ! )
8. Radioactive and toxic waste sites --- photography, sampling, and survey without risk
9. Geology --- Oil field exploration; survey of volcanic processes and sampling of lava and ejecta from eruptions, without the hazard that recently took the life of two experienced volcanologists .
10. Federal & State Forest and Wildlife Services --- tree census; lumber poaching; game and fish poaching
11. Telecommunications --- surveying & designing fiber optic cable installations
12. Meteorological observations --- measuring wind speed, air pressure and temperature, dew point, & humidity at various altitudes above ground level
13. Hoisting communications antennas during emergency situations
14. Fishing --- spotting big game fish for sport fishing; scouting for schools of food fish for purse seining; seining schools of fish & invertebrates visible from the air, for sale as bait to both commercial and sports fishermen, responsibly increasing the harvest with a minimum of wasteful by-catch.
15. Monitoring railways, pipelines, and power lines --- a constant and ever-present safety requirement --- that can prove very difficult in overgrown areas, or results in expensive and wasteful ground-clearing .
16. Monitoring air pollutants for measuring air quality standards .
17. Agriculture --- Precision agriculture techniques using remote sensing technology to monitor crop moisture content AND to perform no-harm seeding from the air, in which the soil does not get compacted by heavy tractors and therefore remains friable as a good seed bed with maximum germination and a larger harvestable crop. Aaaaah-h-h, at last ! Here is the one Application they seem to have heard about
18. Archaeological site mapping; correlating aerial photographs with ground level excavations and discoveries
19. Commercial aerial photography for tourist and visitors’ bureaus, yacht brokers, school programs; realtors and real estate developers;
20. "Green" non-disruptive exploration of ecologically sensitive biospheres, such as rain forests and forest canopies sheltering endangered species
21. Lifting transmitters & receivers into the sky for maximum range.
22. Long term recording in place by meteorological instruments -- anemometers, humidity meters, thermometers, etc.
23. Air sampling for pollutants, particulates, insects, and pollen.
24. Acoustic sensors for detection of intruders, without interference by the noise of internal combustion engines
25. Detection of mines & other explosive devices [especially relevant for civilian use, detection of unexploded abandoned mines, a major cause of death and crippling injuries to children in former war zones ]
26. Thermal imaging applications 27. Crowd control and detection devices by law enforcement agencies
... and many more, too numerous to list .
Sadly, the length, complexity, and copyright protection of articles on the manufacture of biofuels derived from algae preclude our reprinting them here . This discussion of airships does not even touch on the cost, difficulty, and environmental effects of manufacturing algae as biofuel. As our math professor used to say just before dismissing the class, "I leave the solution of that problem to the class as homework".
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