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151-435: "L-13" is the name of the zeppelin that left a trail of bombs across Clerkenwell in 1915. One of which destroyed the building at L-13's previous site on Farringdon Road L-13 claims it "is a creative platform, spiritual home and technical epicentre for a small group of artists that Lowe has found himself working with - both in collaborative venture and by way of support for the individual artists ... We are also physical home to

302-558: A bright golden finger, quite small (...) Then there was flashes near the ground—and the shaking noise. It was like Milton —then there was war in heaven. (...) I cannot get over it, that the moon is not Queen of the sky by night, and the stars the lesser lights. It seems the Zeppelin is in the zenith of the night, golden like a moon, having taken control of the sky; and the bursting shells are the lesser lights. The raids continued in 1916. In December 1915, additional P class Zeppelins and

453-409: A clear escape route or were close to the bow of the ship, which hung burning in the air for too long for most of them to escape death. Most of the crew in the bow died in the fire, although at least one was filmed falling from the bow to his death. Most of the passengers who died were trapped in the starboard side of the passenger deck. Not only was the wind blowing the fire toward the starboard side, but

604-410: A combination of Pomeroy and Brock explosive ammunition with Buckingham incendiary ammunition was used in fighter aircraft machine guns during 1916. The British had been concerned over the threat posed by Zeppelins since 1909, and attacked the Zeppelin bases early in the war. LZ 25 was destroyed in its hangar at Düsseldorf on 8 October 1914 by bombs dropped by Flt Lt Reginald Marix, RNAS, and

755-533: A combination of engine failure and high winds, L 3 crashing on the Danish island of Fanø without loss of life and L 4 coming down at Blaavands Huk ; eleven crew escaped from the forward gondola, after which the lightened airship with four crew members remaining in the aft engine car was blown out to sea and lost. At this stage in the war there was no clear doctrine for the use of Naval airships. A single large Zeppelin, L 5, played an unimportant part in

906-691: A consequence of the RNAS raid both the Army and Navy withdrew from their bases in Belgium. After an ineffective attack by L 10 on Tyneside on 15–16 June the short summer nights discouraged further raids for some months, and the remaining Army Zeppelins were reassigned to the Eastern and Balkan fronts. The Navy resumed raids on Britain in August, when three largely ineffective raids were carried out. On 10 August

1057-479: A continuous patrol of two fighters over Paris at an altitude from which they could promptly attack arriving zeppelins avoiding the delay required to reach the zeppelin altitude. Two further missions were flown against Paris in January 1916: on 29 January LZ 79 killed 23 and injured another 30 but was so severely damaged by anti-aircraft fire that it crashed during the return journey. A second mission by LZ 77

1208-528: A crew member as the suspect. Erich Spehl, a rigger on the Hindenburg who died of burns in the Infirmary, was named as a potential saboteur. Ten years later, Michael MacDonald Mooney's book The Hindenburg , which was based heavily on Hoehling's sabotage hypothesis, also identified Spehl as a possible saboteur; Mooney's book was made into the film The Hindenburg (1975), a mostly fictionalized account of

1359-404: A fire which despite the attendance of 22 fire engines caused over half a million pounds of damage: Mathy then turned east, dropping his remaining bombs on Liverpool Street station . The Zeppelin was the target of concentrated anti-aircraft fire, but no hits were scored and the falling shrapnel caused both damage and alarm on the ground. The raid killed 22 people and injured 87. The monetary cost of

1510-446: A large difference in potential to form between the skin and the frame. In order to make up for the delay of more than 12 hours in its transatlantic flight, the Hindenburg passed through a weather front of high humidity and high electrical charge. Although the mooring lines were not wet when they first hit the ground and ignition took place four minutes after, Eckener theorised that they may have become wet in these four minutes. When

1661-484: A major attraction on the Graf Zeppelin . On both the older and newer vessels, the external viewing windows were often open during flight. The flight altitude was so low that no pressurization of the cabins was necessary. The Hindenburg did maintain a pressurized air-locked smoking room: no flame was allowed, but a single electric lighter was provided, which could not be removed from the room. Access to Zeppelins

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1812-459: A minute because I've lost my voice. This is the worst thing I've ever witnessed. The newsreel footage was shot by four newsreel camera teams: Pathé News , Movietone News , Hearst News of the Day , and Paramount News . Al Gold of Fox Movietone News later received a Presidential Citation for his work. One of the most widely circulated photographs of the disaster (see photo at top of article), showing

1963-483: A mortgage of Count von Zeppelin's wife's estate, and a 100,000 mark contribution by Count von Zeppelin himself allowed the construction of LZ 2 , which made only a single flight on 17 January 1906. After both engines failed it made a forced landing in the Allgäu mountains, where a storm subsequently damaged the anchored ship beyond repair. Incorporating all the usable parts of LZ 2, its successor LZ 3 became

2114-418: A navigational error caused by high winds and poor visibility. The commander judged it proper to land the airship to demonstrate that the incursion was accidental, and brought the ship down on the military parade-ground at Lunéville . The airship remained on the ground until the following day, permitting a detailed examination by French airship experts. In 1909, Count Zeppelin founded the world's first airline,

2265-413: A number of individual gasbags. This allowed the craft to be much larger than non-rigid airships , which relied on the inflation of a single-pressure envelope to maintain their shape. The framework of most Zeppelins was made of duralumin , a combination of aluminium , copper , and two or three other metals, the exact composition of which was kept secret for years. Early Zeppelins used rubberized cotton for

2416-468: A number of passengers to safety) jammed shut during the crash, further trapping those passengers on the starboard side. Nonetheless, some did manage to escape from the starboard passenger decks. By contrast, all but a few of the passengers on the port side of the ship survived the fire, with some of them escaping virtually unscathed. Although the best-remembered airship disaster, it was not the worst. Just over twice as many (73 of 76 on board) had perished when

2567-399: A potential bomb threat, there is no evidence they were on board to do so, and military observers were present on previous flights to study navigational techniques and weather forecasting practices of the airship crew. However, opponents of the sabotage hypothesis argued that only speculation supported sabotage as a cause of the fire, and no credible evidence of sabotage was produced at any of

2718-461: A public spectacle as people rushed out into the street to catch sight of the airship. After passing over the field at 4:00 p.m., Pruss took passengers on a tour over the seashore of New Jersey while waiting for the weather to clear. After being notified at 6:22 p.m. that the storms had passed, Pruss directed the airship back to Lakehurst to make its landing almost half a day late. As this would leave much less time than anticipated to service and prepare

2869-543: A rigid envelope. In 1898, Count Zeppelin founded the Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Luftschiffahrt (Society for the Promotion of Airship Flight), contributing more than half of its 800,000  mark share-capital himself. Responsibility for the detail design was given to Kober, whose place was later taken by Ludwig Dürr , and construction of the first airship began in 1899 in a floating assembly-hall or hangar in

3020-419: A safety roll when he landed. He injured his ankle nonetheless, and was dazedly crawling away when a member of the ground crew came up, slung the diminutive Späh under one arm, and ran him clear of the fire. Of the 12 crewmen in the bow of the airship, only three survived. Four of these 12 men were standing on the mooring shelf, a platform up at the very tip of the bow from which the forwardmost landing ropes and

3171-543: A scheduled daily service between Berlin , Munich , and Friedrichshafen in 1919, the airships built for that service eventually had to be surrendered under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles , which also prohibited Germany from building large airships. An exception was made to allow the construction of one airship for the United States Navy , the order for which saved the company from extinction. In 1926,

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3322-482: A scheduled service between cities, but generally operated pleasure cruises, carrying twenty passengers. The airships were given names in addition to their production numbers. LZ 6 first flew on 25 August 1909 and was accidentally destroyed in Baden-Oos on 14 September 1910 by a fire in its hangar. The second DELAG airship, LZ 7 Deutschland , made its maiden voyage on 19 June 1910. On 28 June it set off on

3473-715: A sense of national pride regarding his work, and spontaneous donations from the public began pouring in, eventually totalling over six million marks. This enabled the Count to found the Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH (Airship Construction Zeppelin Ltd.) and the Zeppelin Foundation . Before World War I (1914–1918) the Zeppelin company manufactured 21 more airships. The Imperial German Army bought LZ 3 and LZ 5 (a sister-ship to LZ 4 which

3624-458: A shock as the port trail rope overtightened; the officers in the control car initially thought the shock was caused by a broken rope. At 7:25 p.m. local time, the Hindenburg caught fire and quickly became engulfed in flames. Eyewitness statements disagree as to where the fire initially broke out; several witnesses on the port side saw yellow-red flames first jump forward of the top fin near the ventilation shaft of cells 4 and 5. Other witnesses on

3775-510: A short career, first flying on 30 March 1911 and becoming damaged beyond repair when caught by a strong cross-wind while being walked out of its shed on 16 May. The company's fortunes changed with the next ship, LZ 10 Schwaben , which first flew on 26 June 1911 and carried 1,553 passengers in 218 flights before catching fire after a gust tore it from its mooring near Düsseldorf. Other DELAG ships included LZ 11 Viktoria Luise (1912), LZ 13 Hansa (1912) and LZ 17 Sachsen (1913). By

3926-519: A similar manner to fallen war heroes, and grassroots movements to fund zeppelin construction (as happened after the 1908 crash of the LZ 4 ) were expressly forbidden by the Nazi government . There had been a series of other airship accidents prior to the Hindenburg fire; many were caused by bad weather. The Graf Zeppelin had flown safely for more than 1.6 million kilometers (1.0 million miles), including

4077-561: A single round-trip passage to Rio de Janeiro , Brazil, in late March, the Hindenburg departed from Frankfurt , Germany, on the evening of May 3, on the first of ten round trips between Europe and the United States that were scheduled for its second year of commercial service. American Airlines had contracted with the operators of the Hindenburg to shuttle passengers from Lakehurst to Newark for connections to airplane flights. Except for strong headwinds that slowed its progress,

4228-468: A special Blau gas produced by the Zeppelin facility in Friedrichshafen. The combustible Blau gas was formulated to make its weight near that of air, so that its storage and consumption had little effect on the zeppelin's buoyancy . Blau gas was used on the first zeppelin voyage to America, starting in 1929. Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin 's interest in airship development began in 1874, when he

4379-476: A third raid on 4 May ended with it being brought down by anti-aircraft fire. The crew survived but were taken prisoner. When Romania entered the war in August 1916, LZ 101 was transferred to Yambol and bombed Bucharest on 28 August, 4 September and 25 September. LZ 86 transferred to Szentandras and made a single attack on the Ploiești oil fields on 4 September but was wrecked on attempting to land after

4530-554: A total destruction time of about 16 seconds. Some of the duralumin framework of the airship was salvaged and shipped back to Germany, where it was recycled and used in the construction of military aircraft for the Luftwaffe , as were the frames of the LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin and LZ 130 Graf Zeppelin II when both were scrapped in 1940. In the days after the disaster, a board of inquiry

4681-465: A voyage to publicise Zeppelins, carrying 19 journalists as passengers. A combination of adverse weather and engine failure brought it down at Mount Limberg near Bad Iburg in Lower Saxony, its hull getting stuck in trees. All passengers and crew were unhurt, except for one crew member who broke his leg when he jumped from the craft. It was replaced by LZ 8 Deutschland II , which also had

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4832-406: Is an underground space off Clerkenwell Road where they used to stage exhibitions but is now used only as a studio space for the production of their artworks and publications, and the organisation of artist's projects. When still operating as an exhibition space it was described as "Part swish contemporary gallery, part subversive socio-political vision, part artists' studio and part members' club" by

4983-506: Is no evidence suggesting an attempted suicide or official report confirming the presence of a Luger pistol. Initially, before inspecting the scene himself, Eckener mentioned the possibility for a shot as the cause of the disaster, because of threatening letters they received. At the German enquiry Eckener discounted a shot – among many possibilities – as the cause as nearly impossible and highly improbable. Hugo Eckener argued that

5134-556: The New York Daily News . The newsreels and photographs, along with Morrison's passionate reporting, shattered public and industry faith in airships and marked the end of the giant passenger-carrying airships. Also contributing to the downfall of Zeppelins was the arrival of international passenger air travel and Pan American Airlines . Heavier-than-air aircraft regularly crossed the Atlantic and Pacific much faster than

5285-494: The American Civil War . Count Zeppelin began to seriously pursue his project after his early retirement from the army in 1890 at the age of 52. Convinced of the potential importance of aviation, he started working on various designs in 1891, and had completed detailed designs by 1893. An official committee reviewed his plans in 1894, and he received a patent, granted on 31 August 1895, with Theodor Kober producing

5436-573: The Battle of the Dogger Bank on 24 January 1915. L 5 was carrying out a routine patrol when it picked up Admiral Hipper 's radio signal announcing that he was engaged with the British battle cruiser squadron. Heading towards the German fleet's position, the Zeppelin was forced to climb above the cloud cover by fire from the British fleet: its commander then decided that it was his duty to cover

5587-566: The Hindenburg burned out within about ninety seconds. At the time of the disaster, sabotage was commonly put forward as the cause of the fire, initially by Hugo Eckener , former head of the Zeppelin Company and the "old man" of German airships. In initial reports, before inspecting the accident, Eckener mentioned the possibility of a shot as the cause of the disaster, because of threatening letters that had been received, but did not rule out other causes. Eckener later publicly endorsed

5738-429: The benzole plant at Skinningrove and three set off to bomb London: two were forced to turn back but L 13, commanded by Kapitänleutnant Heinrich Mathy reached London. The bomb-load included a 300-kilogram (660 lb) bomb, the largest yet carried. This exploded near Smithfield Market , destroying several houses and killing two men. More bombs fell on the textile warehouses north of St Paul's Cathedral , causing

5889-509: The coronation of King George VI and Queen Elizabeth in London the following week. The airship was hours behind schedule when it passed over Boston on the morning of May 6, and its landing at Lakehurst was expected to be further delayed because of afternoon thunderstorms. Advised of the poor weather conditions at Lakehurst, Captain Max Pruss charted a course over Manhattan Island , causing

6040-466: The helium -filled U.S. Navy scout airship USS  Akron crashed at sea off the New Jersey coast four years earlier on April 4, 1933. Werner Franz , the 14-year-old cabin boy, was initially dazed on realizing the ship was on fire but when a water tank above him burst open, putting out the fire around him, he was spurred to action. He made his way to a nearby hatch and dropped through it just as

6191-505: The 130 km/h (80 mph) speed of the Hindenburg . The one advantage that the Hindenburg had over such aircraft was the comfort that it afforded its passengers. In contrast to the media coverage in the United States, media coverage of the disaster in Germany was more subdued. Although some photographs of the disaster were published in newspapers, the newsreel footage was not released until after World War II. German victims were memorialized in

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6342-440: The 24-hour trial flight ended when LZ 4 had to make a landing at Echterdingen near Stuttgart because of mechanical problems. During the stop, a storm tore the airship away from its moorings on the afternoon of 5 August 1908. It crashed into a tree, caught fire, and quickly burnt out. No one was seriously injured. This accident would have finished Zeppelin's experiments, but his flights had generated huge public interest and

6493-490: The 6  m/s ( 21.6 km/h (13.4 mph) ) velocity attained by the French airship La France . Despite this performance, the shareholders declined to invest more money, and so the company was liquidated, with Count von Zeppelin purchasing the ship and equipment. The Count wished to continue experimenting, but he eventually dismantled the ship in 1901. Donations, the profits of a special lottery , some public funding,

6644-539: The Army and the Navy. At the war’s outset, the Army assumed control of the three remaining DELAG airships, having already decommissioned three older Zeppelins, including Z I. Throughout the war, the Navy primarily used its Zeppelins for reconnaissance missions. Although Zeppelin bombing raids, especially those aimed at London, captivated the German public’s imagination, they had limited material success. Nevertheless, these raids—along with later bombing raids by airplanes—led to

6795-426: The Atlantic crossing of the Hindenburg was unremarkable until the airship attempted an early-evening landing at Lakehurst three days later on May 6. Although carrying only half its full capacity of passengers (36 of 70) and crewmen (61, including 21 crewman trainees) during the accident flight, the Hindenburg was fully booked for its return flight. Many of the passengers with tickets to Germany were planning to attend

6946-569: The Bay of Manzell near Friedrichshafen on Lake Constance (the Bodensee ). The intention behind the floating hall was to facilitate the difficult task of bringing the airship out of the hall, as it could easily be aligned with the wind. The LZ 1 (LZ for Luftschiff Zeppelin , or "Zeppelin Airship") was 128 metres (420 ft) long with a hydrogen capacity of 11,000 m (400,000 cu ft),

7097-465: The British 3rd Light Cruiser squadron which was in the area. HMS  Yarmouth launched its Sopwith Pup , and Sub-Lt. B. A. Smart succeeded in shooting the Zeppelin down in flames. The cause of the airship's loss was not discovered by the Germans, who believed the Zeppelin had been brought down by anti-aircraft fire from ships. At the beginning of the conflict, the German command had high hopes for

7248-705: The Deutsche Luftschiffahrts-Aktiengesellschaft (German Airship Travel Corporation), generally known as DELAG to promote his airships, initially using LZ 6, which he had hoped to sell to the German Army. Notable aviation figures like Orville Wright offered critical perspectives on the Zeppelin; in a September 1909 New York Times interview, Wright compared airships to steam engines nearing their developmental peak, while seeing airplanes as akin to gas engines with untapped potential for innovation.The airships did not provide

7399-459: The Harry Adams / STOT21stCplanB / NOT Banksy studio, an 1825 Albion Press, The Patented Finger of God Painting Machine and a miniature poodle known as The Beast. We develop creative projects both ambitious and diminutive: publish books, make prints & other artwork editions; convert impractical artistic visions to reality; and promote a playful polemic spirit in all we do." The L-13 HQ

7550-527: The Kaiser, Z X (LZ 29), LZ 35 and the Schütte-Lanz airship SL 2 set off to bomb Paris : SL 2 was damaged by artillery fire while crossing the front and turned back but the two Zeppelins reached Paris and dropped 1,800 kg (4,000 lb) of bombs, killing only one and wounding eight. On the return journey Z X was damaged by anti-aircraft fire and was damaged beyond repair in

7701-618: The M class L 3, did not enter service until May 1914: in the meantime, Sachsen was hired from DELAG as a training ship. By the outbreak of war in August 1914, Zeppelin had started constructing the first M class airships, which had a length of 158 m (518 ft), with a volume of 22,500 cubic metres (794,500 cu ft) and a useful load of 9,100 kilograms (20,100 lb). Their three Maybach C-X engines produced 470 kilowatts (630 hp) each, and they could reach speeds of up to 84 kilometres per hour (52 mph). During World War I, Germany’s airships were operated separately by

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7852-425: The Navy landing party for the airship, and a survivor of the crashed American military airship, USS Shenandoah , shouted the famous order, "Navy men, Stand fast!!" to successfully rally his personnel to conduct rescue operations despite the considerable danger from the flames. The time that it took from the first signs of disaster to the bow crashing to the ground is reported as 32, 34 or 37 seconds. Since none of

8003-526: The Urban Junkies website. The L-13 artists are Jamie Reid , Billy Childish , Jimmy Cauty , Harry Adams and STOT21stCplanB. 51°31′14″N 0°06′23″W  /  51.5205°N 0.1063°W  / 51.5205; -0.1063 Zeppelin A Zeppelin is a type of rigid airship named after the German inventor Ferdinand von Zeppelin ( German pronunciation: [ˈt͡sɛpəliːn] ) who pioneered rigid airship development at

8154-459: The Zeppelin's final flight. The producers of the film were sued by Hoehling for plagiarism, but Hoehling's case was dismissed because he had presented his sabotage hypothesis as historical fact, and it is not possible to claim ownership of historical facts. Hoehling claimed the following in naming Spehl as the culprit: Hoehling's (and later Mooney's) hypothesis goes on to say that it is unlikely that Spehl wanted to kill people, and that he intended

8305-420: The agreement of Kaiser Wilhelm II to a five-year program of expansion of German naval-airship strength, involving the building of two airship bases and constructing a fleet of ten airships. The first airship of the program, L 2, was ordered on 30 January. L 1 was lost on 9 September near Heligoland when caught in a storm while taking part in an exercise with the German fleet. 14 crew members drowned,

8456-519: The airfield at Lakehurst". By the time he left the hotel the next morning to travel to Berlin for a briefing on the disaster, the only answer that he had for the reporters waiting outside to question him was that based on what he knew, the Hindenburg had "exploded over the airfield"; sabotage might be a possibility. However, as he learned more about the disaster, particularly that the airship had burned rather than actually "exploded", he grew more and more convinced that static discharge, rather than sabotage,

8607-517: The airship commanders commented on the improved defences of the city. L 15 began bombing over Charing Cross , the first bombs striking the Lyceum Theatre and the corner of Exeter and Wellington Streets, killing 17 and injuring 20. None of the other Zeppelins reached central London: bombs fell on Woolwich, Guildford , Tonbridge , Croydon , Hertford and an army camp near Folkestone. A total of 71 people were killed and 128 injured. This

8758-458: The airship crashing with the mooring mast in the foreground, was photographed by Sam Shere of International News Photos. When the fire started he did not have the time to put the camera to his eye and shot the photo "from the hip". Murray Becker of Associated Press photographed the fire engulfing the airship while it was still on even keel using his 4 × 5 Speed Graphic camera. His next photograph (see right), shows flames bursting out of

8909-488: The airship for its scheduled departure back to Europe, the public was informed that they would not be permitted at the mooring location or be able to come aboard the Hindenburg during its stay in port. Around 7:00 p.m., at an altitude of 650 feet (200 m), the Hindenburg made its final approach to the Lakehurst Naval Air Station. This was to be a high landing, known as a flying moor because

9060-452: The airship made a sharp full-speed left turn to the west around the landing field because the ground crew was not ready. At 7:11 p.m., it turned back toward the landing field and valved gas. All engines idled ahead and the airship began to slow. Captain Pruss ordered aft engines full astern at 7:14 p.m. while at an altitude of 394 ft (120 m), to try to brake the airship. At 7:17 p.m.,

9211-470: The airship to burn after the landing. However, with the ship already over 12 hours late, Spehl was unable to find an excuse to reset the timer on his bomb. It has been suggested that Adolf Hitler himself ordered the Hindenburg to be destroyed in retaliation for Eckener's anti-Nazi opinions. Since the publication of Hoehling's book, most airship historians, including Douglas Robinson, have dismissed Hoehling's sabotage hypothesis because no solid evidence

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9362-747: The airship was in reconnaissance over the North Sea and the Baltic , and the majority of airships manufactured were used by the Navy. Patrolling had priority over any other airship activity. During the war almost 1,000 missions were flown over the North Sea alone, compared with about 50 strategic bombing raids. The German Navy had some 15 Zeppelins in commission by the end of 1915 and was able to have two or more patrolling continuously at any one time. However, their operations were limited by weather conditions. On 16 February, L 3 and L 4 were lost owing to

9513-471: The airship would drop its landing ropes and mooring cable at a high altitude, and then be winched down to the mooring mast . This type of landing maneuver would reduce the number of ground crewmen but would require more time. Although the high landing was a common procedure for American airships, the Hindenburg had performed this maneuver only a few times in 1936 while landing in Lakehurst. At 7:09 p.m.,

9664-474: The airship's back a good minute before the fire broke out. Standing outside the main gate to the Naval Air Station, he watched, together with his wife and son, as the Zeppelin approached the mast and dropped her bow lines. A minute thereafter, by Mr. Heald's estimation, he first noticed a dim "blue flame" flickering along the backbone girder about one-quarter the length abaft the bow to the tail. There

9815-479: The airship. A suspect favored by Commander Rosendahl, Captain Pruss, and others among the Hindenburg's crew, was passenger Joseph Späh, a German acrobat who survived the fire. He brought with him a dog, a German shepherd named Ulla, as a surprise for his children. He reportedly made a number of unaccompanied visits to feed his dog, who was being kept in a freight room near the stern of the ship. Those who suspected Späh based their suspicions primarily on those trips into

9966-400: The airships, which were considerably more capable than contemporary light fixed-wing machines: they were almost as fast, could carry multiple machine guns, and had enormously greater bomb -load range and endurance. Contrary to expectation, it was not easy to ignite the hydrogen using standard bullets and shrapnel. The Allies only started to exploit the Zeppelin's great vulnerability to fire when

10117-531: The antiaircraft guns had their first success, causing L 12 to come down into the sea off Zeebrugge , and on 17–18 August L 10 became the first Navy airship to reach London. Mistaking the reservoirs of the Lea Valley for the Thames, it dropped its bombs on Walthamstow and Leytonstone. L 10 was destroyed a little over two weeks later: it was struck by lightning and caught fire off Cuxhaven , and

10268-474: The axial walkway, bursting through the bow (and the bow gas cells) like a blowtorch. The three men from the forward section who survived (elevatorman Kurt Bauer, cook Alfred Grözinger, and electrician Josef Leibrecht) were those furthest aft of the bow, and two of them (Bauer and Grözinger) happened to be standing near two large triangular air vents, through which cool air was being drawn by the fire. Neither of these men sustained more than superficial burns. Most of

10419-543: The beginning of the 20th century. Zeppelin's notions were first formulated in 1874 and developed in detail in 1893. They were patented in Germany in 1895 and in the United States in 1899. After the outstanding success of the Zeppelin design, the word zeppelin came to be commonly used to refer to all forms of rigid airships . Zeppelins were first flown commercially in 1910 by Deutsche Luftschiffahrts-AG (DELAG),

10570-444: The crash or in the fire. The majority of the victims were burned to death, while others died jumping from the airship at an excessive height, or as a consequence of either smoke inhalation or falling debris. Six other crew members, three passengers, and Allen Hagaman died in the following hours or days, mostly as a result of the burns. The majority of the crewmen who died were up inside the ship's hull, where they either did not have

10721-571: The damage was over one sixth of the total damage costs inflicted by bombing raids during the war. After three more raids were scattered by the weather, a five-Zeppelin raid was launched by the Navy on 13 October, the "Theatreland Raid." Arriving over the Norfolk coast at around 18:30, the Zeppelins encountered new ground defences installed since the September raid; these had no success, although

10872-400: The disaster was preserved. Parts of Morrison's broadcast were later dubbed onto newsreel footage. That gave the impression that the words and film were recorded together, but that was not the case. It's practically standing still now they've dropped ropes out of the nose of the ship; and (uh) they've been taken ahold of down on the field by a number of men. It's starting to rain again; it's...

11023-558: The diversion of men and resources from the Western Front. Additionally, the fear of these attacks impacted industrial production to some extent. Early offensive operations by Army airships quickly revealed their extreme vulnerability to ground fire when flown at low altitudes, leading to the loss of several airships. Since no dedicated bombs had been developed at the time, these early raids dropped artillery shells instead. On 20 March 1915, temporarily forbidden from bombing London by

11174-406: The east coast and around the Thames estuary, but bombing accuracy was poor owing to the height at which the airships flew and navigation was problematic. The airships relied largely on dead reckoning , supplemented by a radio direction-finding system of limited accuracy. After blackouts became widespread, many bombs fell at random on uninhabited countryside. The first raid on England took place on

11325-401: The entire crew was killed. Three Army airships set off to bomb London on 7–8 September, of which two succeeded: SL 2 dropped bombs between Southwark and Woolwich : LZ 74 scattered 39 bombs over Cheshunt before heading on to London and dropping a single bomb on Fenchurch Street station . The Navy attempted to follow up the Army's success the following night. One Zeppelin targeted

11476-575: The extreme cold, and one of the airships was destroyed in a forced landing at Seerappen . The plan was subsequently abandoned. In 1917 the German High Command made an attempt to use a Zeppelin to deliver supplies to Lettow-Vorbeck's forces in German East Africa . L 57 , a specially lengthened craft was to have flown the mission but was destroyed shortly after completion. A Zeppelin then under construction, L 59 ,

11627-414: The fire started. The flames quickly spread forward first consuming cells 1 to 9, and the rear end of the structure imploded. Almost instantly, two tanks (it is disputed whether they contained water or fuel) burst out of the hull as a result of the shock of the blast. Buoyancy was lost on the stern of the ship, and the bow lurched upwards while the ship's back broke; the falling stern stayed in trim. As

11778-519: The fire was started by an electric spark which was caused by a buildup of static electricity on the airship. The spark ignited hydrogen on the outer skin. Proponents of the static spark hypothesis point out that the airship's skin was not constructed in a way that allowed its charge to be distributed evenly throughout the craft. The skin was separated from the duralumin frame by non-conductive ramie cords which had been lightly covered in metal to improve conductivity but not very effectively, allowing

11929-466: The fire, and then to subsequently have died at area hospitals during the night or early the following morning. Hydrogen fires are less destructive to immediate surroundings than gasoline explosions because of the buoyancy of diatomic hydrogen, which causes the heat of combustion to be released upwards more than circumferentially as the leaked mass ascends in the atmosphere; hydrogen fires are more survivable than fires of gasoline or wood. The hydrogen in

12080-464: The first circumnavigation of the globe by an airship. The Zeppelin company's promotions had prominently featured the fact that no passenger had been injured on any of its airships. There were a total of 35 deaths out of 97 people on the airship, including 13 of the 36 passengers and 22 of the 61 crew; most survivors were severely burned. Among the killed was also one ground crewman, civilian linesman Allen Hagaman. Ten passengers and 16 crewmen died in

12231-567: The first fatalities in a Zeppelin accident. Less than six weeks later, on 17 October, LZ 18 (L 2) caught fire during its acceptance trials, killing the entire crew. These accidents deprived the Navy of most of its experienced personnel: the head of the Admiralty Air Department was killed in the L ;1 and his successor died in the L 2. The Navy was left with three partially trained crews. The next Navy zeppelin,

12382-399: The first flame appeared on the port side just ahead of the port fin, and was followed by flames that burned on top. Commander Rosendahl testified to the flames in front of the upper fin being "mushroom-shaped". One witness on the starboard side reported a fire beginning lower and behind the rudder on that side. On board, people heard a muffled detonation and those in the front of the ship felt

12533-529: The first of the new Q class airships were delivered. The Q class was an enlargement of the P ;class with improved ceiling and bomb-load. Hindenburg disaster The Hindenburg disaster was an airship accident that occurred on May 6, 1937, in Manchester Township, New Jersey , United States. The LZ 129 Hindenburg ( Luftschiff Zeppelin #129 ; Registration : D-LZ 129)

12684-406: The first sign of trouble he smashed the window with his movie camera with which he had been filming the landing (the film survived the disaster). As the ship neared the ground he lowered himself out the window and hung onto the window ledge, letting go when the ship was perhaps 20 feet (6.1 m) above the ground. His acrobat's instincts kicked in, and Späh kept his feet under him and attempted to do

12835-494: The first truly successful Zeppelin. This renewed the interest of the German military, but a condition of purchase of an airship was a 24-hour endurance trial. This was beyond the capabilities of LZ 3, leading Zeppelin to construct his fourth design, the LZ 4 , first flown on 20 June 1908. On 1 July it was flown over Switzerland to Zürich and then back to Lake Constance, covering 386 km (240 mi) and reaching an altitude of 795 m (2,608 ft). An attempt to complete

12986-524: The following night bombed the suburbs of Asnières and Versailles, with little effect. Airship operations in the Balkans started in the autumn of 1915, and an airship base was constructed at Szentandras . In November 1915, LZ 81 was used to fly diplomats to Sofia for negotiations with the Bulgarian government. This base was also used by LZ 85 to conduct two raids on Salonika in early 1916:

13137-446: The formal hearings. Erich Spehl died in the fire and was therefore unable to refute the accusations that surfaced a quarter of a century later. The FBI investigated Joseph Späh and reported finding no evidence of Späh having any connection to a sabotage plot. According to his wife, Evelyn, Späh was quite upset over the accusations – she later recalled that her husband was outside their home cleaning windows when he first learned that he

13288-404: The forward part of the ship was briefly rebounding into the air. He began to run toward the starboard side, but stopped and turned around and ran the other way because wind was pushing the flames in that direction. He escaped without injury and was the last surviving crew member when he died in 2014. The last survivor, Werner G. Doehner , died November 8, 2019. At the time of the disaster, Doehner

13439-406: The front bulkhead of gas cell 4, which "suddenly disappeared by the heat". As other gas cells started to catch fire, the fire spread more to the starboard side and the ship dropped rapidly. Although the landing was being filmed by cameramen from four newsreel teams and at least one spectator, with numerous photographers also being at the scene, no footage or photographs are known to exist of the moment

13590-496: The gasbags, but most later craft used goldbeater's skin made from cattle gut. The first Zeppelins had long cylindrical hulls with tapered ends and complex multi-plane fins . During World War I, following the lead of the rival firm Schütte-Lanz Luftschiffbau, almost all later airships changed to the more familiar streamlined shape with cruciform tail fins. Zeppelins were propelled by several internal combustion engines , mounted in gondolas or engine cars attached outside

13741-399: The ground crew grabbed the mooring lines. At 7:25 p.m., a few witnesses saw the fabric ahead of the upper fin flutter as if gas was leaking. Others reported seeing a dim blue flame – possibly static electricity , or St. Elmo's Fire – moments before the fire on top and in the back of the ship near the point where the flames first appeared. Several other eyewitness testimonies suggest that

13892-402: The ground, causing the bow to bounce up slightly as one final gas cell burned away. At this point, most of the fabric on the hull had also burned away and the bow finally crashed to the ground. Although the hydrogen had finished burning, the Hindenburg 's diesel fuel burned for several more hours. In the face of this catastrophe, Chief Petty Officer Frederick J. "Bull" Tobin, in command of

14043-403: The industrialist Carl Berg , then engaged in construction work on the second airship design of David Schwarz . Berg was under contract not to supply aluminium to any other airship manufacturer, and subsequently made a payment to Schwarz's widow as compensation for breaking this agreement. Schwarz's design differed fundamentally from Zeppelin's, crucially lacking the use of separate gasbags inside

14194-420: The landing field, which were broadcast the next day. A variety of theories have been put forward for both the cause of ignition and the initial fuel for the ensuing fire. The publicity shattered public confidence in the giant, passenger-carrying rigid airship and marked the abrupt end of the airship era . The Hindenburg made ten trips to the United States in 1936. After opening its 1937 season by completing

14345-496: The leaking hydrogen. In his book LZ-129 Hindenburg (1964), Zeppelin historian Douglas Robinson commented that although ignition of free hydrogen by static discharge had become a favored hypothesis, no such discharge was seen by any of the witnesses who testified at the official investigation into the accident in 1937. He continues: But within the past year, I have located an observer, Professor Mark Heald of Princeton, New Jersey, who undoubtedly saw St. Elmo's Fire flickering along

14496-557: The men standing along the bow stairway either fell aft into the fire, or tried to leap from the ship when it was still too high in the air. Three of the four men standing on the mooring shelf inside the very tip of the bow were actually taken from the wreck alive, though one (Erich Spehl, a rigger) died shortly afterwards in the Air Station's infirmary, and the other two (helmsman Alfred Bernhard and apprentice elevatorman Ludwig Felber) were reported by newspapers to have initially survived

14647-549: The mines' locations. In 1917, the Royal Navy began to take effective countermeasures against airship patrols over the North Sea. In April, the first Curtiss H.12 Large America long-range flying boats were delivered to RNAS Felixstowe , and in July 1917, the aircraft carrier HMS  Furious entered service and launching platforms for aeroplanes were fitted to the forward turrets of some light cruisers. On 14 May, L 22

14798-630: The mission. Its replacement, LZ 86, was damaged by anti-aircraft fire during its second attack on Bucharest on 26 September and was damaged beyond repair in the resulting forced landing, and was replaced by LZ 97. At the instigation of the Kaiser a plan was made to bomb Saint Petersburg in December 1916. Two Navy zeppelins were transferred to Wainoden on the Courland Peninsula . A preliminary attempt to bomb Reval on 28 December ended in failure caused by operating problems due to

14949-416: The mooring mast and all the folks between it. This is terrible; this is one of the worst of the worst catastrophes in the world. Oh it's... [unintelligible] its flames... Crashing, oh! Oh, four or five hundred feet into the sky, and it's a terrific crash, ladies and gentlemen. There's smoke, and there's flames, now, and the frame is crashing to the ground, not quite to the mooring mast. Oh, the humanity, and all

15100-400: The newsreel cameras were filming the airship when the fire first started, the time of the start can only be estimated from various eyewitness accounts and the duration of the longest footage of the crash. One analysis by NASA 's Addison Bain gives the flame front spread rate across the fabric skin as about 49 ft/s (15 m/s) at some points during the crash, which would have resulted in

15251-586: The night of 19–20 January 1915. Two Zeppelins, L 3 and L 4, intended to attack targets near the River Humber but, diverted by strong winds, eventually dropped their bombs on Great Yarmouth , Sheringham , King's Lynn and the surrounding villages, killing four and injuring 16. Material damage was estimated at £7,740. The Kaiser authorised the bombing of the London docks on 12 February 1915, but no raids on London took place until May. Two Navy raids failed due to bad weather on 14 and 15 April, and it

15402-563: The nose as the bow telescoped upwards. In addition to professional photographers, spectators also photographed the crash. They were stationed in the spectators' area near Hangar No. 1, and had a side-rear view of the airship. Customs broker Arthur Cofod Jr. and 16-year-old Foo Chu both had Leica cameras with high-speed film, allowing them to take a larger number of photographs than the press photographers. Nine of Cofod's photographs were printed in Life magazine, while Chu's photographs were shown in

15553-642: The outbreak of World War I in August 1914, 1588 flights had carried 10,197 fare-paying passengers. On 24 April 1912, the Imperial German Navy ordered its first Zeppelin—an enlarged version of the airships operated by DELAG—which received the naval designation Z 1 and entered Navy service in October 1912. On 18 January 1913 Admiral Alfred von Tirpitz , Secretary of State of the German Imperial Naval Office, obtained

15704-517: The passengers screaming around here! I told you; it – I can't even talk to people, their friends are on there! Ah! It's... it... it's a... ah! I... I can't talk, ladies and gentlemen. Honest: it's just laying there, a mass of smoking wreckage. Ah! And everybody can hardly breathe and talk and the screaming. I... I... I'm sorry. Honest: I... I can hardly breathe. I... I'm going to step inside, where I cannot see it. Charlie, that's terrible. Ah, ah... I can't. Listen, folks; I... I'm gonna have to stop for

15855-413: The port side noted the fire actually began just ahead of the horizontal port fin, only then followed by flames in front of the upper fin. One, with views of the starboard side, saw flames beginning lower and farther aft, near cell 1 behind the rudders. Inside the airship, helmsman Helmut Lau, who was stationed in the lower fin, testified hearing a muffled detonation and looked up to see a bright reflection on

16006-470: The previous unsuccessful attacks had been made by an aircraft operating from one of the Royal Navy's seaplane carriers; now realising that there was a new threat, Strasser ordered airships patrolling in the Terschilling area to maintain an altitude of at least 4,000 m (13,000 ft), considerably reducing their effectiveness. On 21 August, L 23, patrolling off the Danish coast, was spotted by

16157-554: The purported damage claimed by Kubis. In an interview with the TV show Secrets & Mysteries , Hoehling himself asserted it was only his theory and also suggested a short circuit could be another potential cause of the fire. Additionally, Mooney's book has been criticized as having numerous fictional elements and factual errors, and it has been suggested that the plot was created for the then-upcoming 1975 film. Although Mooney alleges that three Luftwaffe officers were aboard to investigate

16308-468: The rain had (uh) slacked up a little bit. The back motors of the ship are just holding it (uh) just enough to keep it from...It's burst into flames! It burst into flames and it's falling, it's crashing! Watch it; watch it, folks get out of the way; Get out of the way; Get this, Charlie; get this, Charlie! It's fire... and it's crashing! It's crashing terrible! Oh, my! Get out of the way, please! It's burning and bursting into flames and the... and it's falling on

16459-489: The restrictions on airship construction were lifted and, with the aid of donations from the public, work began on the construction of LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin . That revived the company's fortunes and, during the 1930s, the airships Graf Zeppelin , and the even larger LZ 129 Hindenburg operated regular transatlantic flights from Germany to North America and Brazil. The spire of the Empire State Building

16610-410: The resulting forced landing. Three weeks later LZ 35 suffered a similar fate after bombing Poperinghe . Paris mounted a more effective defense against zeppelin raids than London. Zeppelins attacking Paris had to first fly over the system of forts between the front and the city, from which they were subjected to anti-aircraft fire with reduced risk of collateral damage . The French also maintained

16761-435: The retreating German fleet rather than observe British movements. In 1915, patrols were only carried out on 124 days and in other years the total was considerably less. They prevented British ships from approaching Germany, spotted when and where the British were laying mines and later aided in the destruction of those mines. Zeppelins would sometimes land on the sea next to a minesweeper, bring aboard an officer and show him

16912-453: The rigid airship as it was an historical overview of the airship concept. Another proponent of the sabotage hypothesis was Max Pruss , captain of the Hindenburg throughout the airship's career. Pruss flew on nearly every flight of the Graf Zeppelin since 1928 until the Hindenburg was launched in 1936. In a 1960 interview conducted by Kenneth Leish for Columbia University 's Oral History Research Office, Pruss said early dirigible travel

17063-417: The ropes, which were connected to the frame, became wet, they would have grounded the frame but not the skin. This would have caused a sudden potential difference between skin and frame (and the airship itself with the overlying air masses) and would have set off an electrical discharge – a spark. Seeking the quickest way to ground, the spark would have jumped from the skin onto the metal framework, igniting

17214-592: The sheds at Cologne as well as the Zeppelin works in Friedrichshafen were also attacked. These raids were followed by the Cuxhaven Raid on Christmas Day 1914, one of the first operations carried out by ship-launched aeroplanes. Airship raids on Great Britain were approved by the Kaiser on 7 January 1915, although he excluded London as a target and further demanded that no attacks be made on historic buildings. The raids were intended to target only military sites on

17365-405: The ship also rolled slightly to starboard as it settled to the ground, with much of the upper hull on that part of the ship collapsing outboard of the starboard observation windows, thus cutting off the escape of many of the passengers on that side. To make matters worse, the sliding door leading from the starboard passenger area to the central foyer and the gangway stairs (through which rescuers led

17516-483: The ship in trim, six men (three of whom were killed in the accident) were then sent to the bow to trim the airship. At 7:21 p.m., while the Hindenburg was at an altitude of 295 ft (90 m), the mooring lines were dropped from the bow; the starboard line was dropped first, followed by the port line. The port line was overtightened as it was connected to the post of the ground winch. The starboard line had still not been connected. A light rain began to fall as

17667-500: The ship's interior to feed his dog, that according to some of the stewards Späh had told anti-Nazi jokes during the flight, recollections by stewards that Späh had seemed agitated by the repeated delays in landing, and that he was an acrobat who could conceivably climb into the airship's rigging to plant a bomb. In 1962, A. A. Hoehling published Who Destroyed the Hindenburg? , in which he rejected all theories but sabotage, and named

17818-471: The static spark hypothesis, including after the war. At the time on a lecture tour in Austria, he was awakened at about 2:30 in the morning (8:30 p.m. Lakehurst time, or approximately an hour after the crash) by the ringing of his bedside telephone. It was a Berlin representative of The New York Times with news that the Hindenburg "exploded yesterday evening at 7 p.m. [ sic ] above

17969-433: The steel mooring cable were released to the ground crew, and which was directly at the forward end of the axial walkway and just ahead of gas cell #16. The rest were standing either along the lower keel walkway ahead of the control car, or else on platforms beside the stairway leading up the curve of the bow to the mooring shelf. During the fire the bow hung in the air at roughly a 45-degree angle and flames shot forward through

18120-515: The structural framework. Some of these could provide reverse thrust for manoeuvring while mooring. Early models had a fairly small externally-mounted gondola for passengers and crew beneath the frame. This space was never heated, because fire outside of the kitchen was considered too risky, and during trips across the North Atlantic or Siberia passengers were forced to bundle in blankets and furs to keep warm and were often miserably cold. By

18271-450: The tail of the Hindenburg crashed into the ground, a burst of flame came out of the nose, killing 9 of the 12 crew members in the bow. There was still gas in the bow section of the ship, so it continued to point upward as the stern collapsed down. The cell behind the passenger decks ignited as the side collapsed inward, and the scarlet lettering reading "Hindenburg" was erased by flames as the bow descended. The airship's gondola wheel touched

18422-456: The technical drawings. Zeppelin's patent described a Lenkbares Luftfahrzeug mit mehreren hintereinander angeordneten Tragkörpern ("Steerable aircraft with several carrier bodies arranged one behind another"), an airship consisting of flexibly articulated rigid sections. The front section, containing the crew and engines, was 117.35 m (385.0 ft) long with a gas capacity of 9,514 m (336,000 cu ft). The middle section

18573-496: The time of the Hindenburg several important changes had made traveling much more comfortable: the passenger space had been relocated to the interior of the framework, passenger rooms were insulated from the exterior by the dining area, and forced-warm air could be circulated from the water that cooled the forward engines. The new design did prevent passengers from enjoying the views from the windows of their berths, which had been

18724-522: The time of the airship exploding, and so there was a significant amount of newsreel coverage and photographs, as well as Herbert Morrison 's eyewitness report for radio station WLS in Chicago , a report that was broadcast the next day. Radio broadcasts were not routinely recorded at the time, however an audio engineer and Morrison had chosen the arrival of the Hindenburg to experiment with recording for delayed broadcast and thus Morrison's narration of

18875-403: The total damage was assessed at £18,596. Aware of the problems that the Germans were experiencing in navigation, this raid caused the government to issue a D notice prohibiting the press from reporting anything about raids that was not mentioned in official statements. Only one of the 15 defensive sorties managed to make visual contact with the enemy, and one of the pilots, Flt Lieut D. M. Barnes,

19026-464: The weather, and as the airships returned to Evere (Brussels) they ran into a counter-raid by RNAS aircraft flying from Furnes , Belgium . LZ 38 was destroyed on the ground and LZ 37 was intercepted in the air by R. A. J. Warneford , who dropped six bombs on the airship, setting it on fire. All but one of the crew died. Warneford was awarded the Victoria Cross for his achievement. As

19177-418: The wind shifted direction from east to southwest, and Captain Pruss ordered a second sharp turn starboard , making an s-shaped flightpath towards the mooring mast. At 7:18 p.m., as the final turn progressed, Pruss ordered 300, 300, and 500 kg (660, 660, and 1100 lb) of water ballast in successive drops because the airship was stern-heavy. The forward gas cells were also valved. As these measures failed to bring

19328-404: The world's first airline in revenue service. By mid-1914, DELAG had carried over 10,000 fare-paying passengers on over 1,500 flights. During World War I , the German military made extensive use of Zeppelins as bombers and as scouts . Numerous bombing raids on Britain resulted in over 500 deaths. The defeat of Germany in 1918 temporarily slowed the airship business. Although DELAG established

19479-466: The wreckage to look for survivors. Pruss's face was badly burned, and he required months of hospitalization and reconstructive surgery, but he survived. Captain Ernst Lehmann escaped the crash with burns to his head and arms and severe burns across most of his back. He died at a nearby hospital the next day. When passenger Joseph Späh , a vaudeville comic acrobat billed as Ben Dova , saw

19630-502: Was president of Germany from 1925 until his death in 1934. Filled with hydrogen , it caught fire and was destroyed during its attempt to dock with its mooring mast at Naval Air Station Lakehurst . The accident caused 35 fatalities (13 passengers and 22 crewmen) among the 97 people on board (36 passengers and 61 crewmen), and an additional fatality on the ground. The disaster was the subject of newsreel coverage , photographs and Herbert Morrison 's recorded radio eyewitness reports from

19781-474: Was 16 metres (52 feet 6 inches) long with an intended useful load of 599 kg (1,321 lb) and the rear section 39.93 m (131.0 ft) long with an intended load of 1,996 kg (4,400 lb). Count Zeppelin's attempts to secure government funding for his project proved unsuccessful, but a lecture given to the Union of German Engineers gained their support. Zeppelin also sought support from

19932-564: Was a German commercial passenger-carrying rigid airship , the lead ship of the Hindenburg class , the longest class of flying machine and the largest airship by envelope volume. It was designed and built by the Zeppelin Company ( Luftschiffbau Zeppelin GmbH ) and operated by the German Zeppelin Airline Company ( Deutsche Zeppelin-Reederei ). It was named after Generalfeldmarschall Paul von Hindenburg , who

20083-446: Was achieved in a number of ways. The Graf Zeppelin ' s gondola was accessed while the vessel was on the ground, via gangways. The Hindenburg also had passenger gangways leading from the ground directly into its hull which could be withdrawn entirely, ground access to the gondola, and an exterior access hatch via its electrical room; this latter was intended for crew use only. On some long-distance zeppelins, engines were powered by

20234-545: Was completed in May 1909) and designated them Z I and Z II respectively. Z II was wrecked in a gale in April 1910, while Z I flew until 1913, when it was decommissioned and replaced by LZ 15, designated ersatz Z I. First flown on 16 January 1913, it was wrecked on 19 March of the same year. In April 1913 its newly built sister-ship LZ 15 (Z IV) accidentally intruded into French airspace owing to

20385-575: Was decided to delay further attempts until the more capable P class Zeppelins were in service. The Army received the first of these, LZ 38, and Erich Linnarz commanded it on a raid over Ipswich on 29–30 April and another, attacking Southend on 9–10 May. LZ 38 also attacked Dover and Ramsgate on 16–17 May, before returning to bomb Southend on 26–27 May. These four raids killed six people and injured six, causing property damage estimated at £16,898. Twice Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) aircraft tried to intercept LZ 38 but on both occasions it

20536-458: Was driven by two 15 horsepower (11 kW) Daimler engines each driving a pair of propellers mounted either side of the envelope via bevel gears and a driveshaft, and was controlled in pitch by moving a weight between its two nacelles . The first flight took place over Lake Constance on 2 July 1900. Damaged during landing, it was repaired and modified and proved its potential in two subsequent flights made on 17 and 24 October 1900, bettering

20687-522: Was eight years old and vacationing with family. He recalled later that his mother threw him and his brother out of the ship and jumped after them; they survived but Doehner's father and sister were killed. When the control car crashed onto the ground, most of the officers leapt through the windows, but became separated. First Officer Captain Albert Sammt found Captain Max Pruss trying to re-enter

20838-419: Was either able to outclimb the aircraft or was already at too great an altitude for the aircraft to intercept. On 31 May Linnarz commanded LZ 38 on the first raid against London. In total some 120 bombs were dropped on a line stretching from Stoke Newington south to Stepney and then north toward Leytonstone . Seven people were killed and 35 injured. 41 fires were started, burning out seven buildings and

20989-471: Was ever presented to support it. No pieces of a bomb were ever discovered (and there is no evidence in existing documentation that the sample collected from the wreckage, and determined to be residue from a dry cell battery, was found anywhere near the stern of the airship), and on closer examination, the evidence against Spehl and his girlfriend turned out to be rather weak. Additionally, it is unlikely that Rigger Knorr would not remain at cell 4 to further assess

21140-418: Was inspired by a lecture given by Heinrich von Stephan on the subject of "World Postal Services and Air Travel" to outline the basic principle of his later craft in a diary entry dated 25 March 1874. It describes a large rigidly framed outer envelope containing several separate gasbags. He had previously encountered Union Army balloons in 1863 when he visited the United States as a military observer during

21291-404: Was killed on attempting to land. The first naval attempt on London took place on 4 June: strong winds caused the commander of L 9 to misjudge his position, and the bombs were dropped on Gravesend . L 9 was also diverted by the weather on 6–7 June, attacking Hull instead of London and causing considerable damage. On the same night an Army raid of three Zeppelins also failed because of

21442-482: Was originally designed to serve as a mooring mast for Zeppelins and other airships, although it was found that high winds made that impossible and the plan was abandoned. The Hindenburg disaster in 1937, along with political and economic developments in Germany in the lead-up to World War II , hastened the demise of airships. The principal feature of the Zeppelin's design was a fabric-covered, rigid metal framework of transverse rings and longitudinal girders enclosing

21593-407: Was safe, and therefore he strongly believed that sabotage was to blame. He stated that on trips to South America, which was a popular destination for German tourists, both airships passed through thunderstorms and were struck by lightning but remained unharmed. Most members of the crew refused to believe that one of them would commit an act of sabotage, insisting only a passenger could have destroyed

21744-516: Was set up at Lakehurst to investigate the cause of the fire. The investigation by the US Commerce Department was headed by Colonel South Trimble Jr, while Hugo Eckener led the German commission. The disaster was well-documented. Heavy publicity about the first transatlantic passenger flight of the year by Zeppelin to the United States had attracted a large number of journalists to the landing. Thus many news crews were on-site at

21895-424: Was shot down near Terschelling Bank by an H.12 flown by Lt. Galpin and Sub-Lt. Leckie, which had been alerted following interception of its radio traffic. Two abortive interceptions were made by Galpin and Leckie on 24 May and 5 June. On 14 June, L 43 was brought down by an H.12 flown by Sub Lts. Hobbs and Dickie. On the same day Galpin and Leckie intercepted and attacked L 46. The Germans had believed that

22046-416: Was suppressed for political reasons. However, it has also been suggested that numerous crewmen subscribed to the sabotage hypothesis because they refused to accept any flaws with the airship or pilot error. Some more sensational newspapers claimed that a Luger pistol with one round fired was found among the wreckage and speculated that a person on board committed suicide or shot the airship. However, there

22197-530: Was suspected of sabotaging the Hindenburg , and was so shocked by the news that he almost fell off the ladder on which he was standing. Neither the German nor the American investigation endorsed any of the sabotage theories. Proponents of the sabotage hypothesis argue that any finding of sabotage would have been an embarrassment for the Nazi regime, and they speculate that such a finding by the German investigation

22348-399: Was the cause. Charles Rosendahl , commander of the Naval Air Station at Lakehurst and the man in overall charge of the ground-based portion of the Hindenburg's landing maneuver, came to believe that the Hindenburg had been sabotaged. He laid out a general case for sabotage in his book What About the Airship? (1938), which was as much an extended argument for the further development of

22499-417: Was the last raid of 1915, as bad weather coincided with the new moon in both November and December 1915 and continued into January 1916. Although these raids had no significant military impact, the psychological effect was considerable. The writer D. H. Lawrence described one raid in a letter to Lady Ottoline Morrell : Then we saw the Zeppelin above us, just ahead, amid a gleaming of clouds: high up, like

22650-399: Was then modified for the mission: it set off from Yambol on 21 November 1917 and nearly reached its destination, but was ordered to return by radio. Its journey covered 6,400 km (4,000 mi) and lasted 95 hours. It was then used for reconnaissance and bombing missions in the eastern Mediterranean. It flew one bombing mission against Naples on 10–11 March 1918. A planned attack on Suez

22801-618: Was turned back by high winds, and on 7 April 1918 it was on a mission to bomb the British naval base at Malta when it caught fire over the Straits of Otranto , with the loss of all its crew. On 5 January 1918, a fire at Ahlhorn destroyed four of the specialised double sheds along with four Zeppelins and one Schütte-Lanz. In July 1918, the Tondern raid conducted by the RAF and Royal Navy, destroyed two Zeppelins in their sheds. The main use of

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