Comments on: Boeing and SkyHook’s Zeppelin-Copter Faces Safety Challenges

By: Club Troppo » ShyHooks

Club Troppo » ShyHooks — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 23:29:24 +0000

[...] this is a cool new development. Boeing is building super airships to double the capacity that can be airlifted around the world. These babys will be the size of [...]

By: A compendium of new airship projects | refractal

A compendium of new airship projects | refractal — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 03:35:40 +0000

[...] very large size, 3. hold only a small fraction of the passengers that commercialaircraft do, 4. Turbulent weather saftey issues yet to be resolved), some interesting military-industrial and plutocratic appropriations and reinventions of airship [...]

By: derrida derider

derrida derider — Mon, 14 Jul 2008 01:29:09 +0000

Yep, hydrogen ain’t such a big safety deal. In any case you can use a hydrogen/helium mix with enough helium to reduce the partial pressure of hydrogen so it won’t burn in air (my physical chemistry isn’t good enough to work this ratio out – anyone wanna try?). That saves on expensive helium.

Heavy freight is rarely time critical, so you just wait out bad weather (don’t forget weather forecasts are far far better now than in the airship’s heyday). And one-off lifts can live with a bit more risk than scheduled passenger services anyway.

By: Tim

Tim — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 18:16:38 +0000

Ummmm…the envelope must rupture for and oxygen must mix with the hydrogen before it becomes flammable. Even then if skin is nonflammable you have jet of fire out the side of the ship. The fire could not travel into the ship and detonate it because of the lack of oxygen. The dangers of hydrogen are overrated, people climb into flying vehicles full of highly flammable material all the time, they’re called jets.

By: RawThinkTank

RawThinkTank — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 15:11:51 +0000

use a smaller separate craft to pull the airship with ropes to avoid loss of thrust at the propellers.

By: roland

roland — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 23:51:06 +0000

I see a big market for this thing. Example: doing what the IceRoad truckers do, but in the summer. Two hundred mile range might be a problem. Can it compete with Sikorsky SkyCrane to (say) build powerlines thru swamps?

By: ruth

ruth — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 22:03:37 +0000

I was told the Hindenburg actually failes because static electricity caused the surface coating (aluminium iirc) to burn – only after that did the hydrogen burn too.

By: john

john — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 21:26:19 +0000

Or maybe the Nazis coated the Hindenburg with a impressive looking coating. Which primarily consisted out of what we cal solid rocket fuel these days.

Hydrogen is just as safe, but ppl just cry “oh the manataa” everytime this subject pops up.

By: Alex

Alex — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 20:32:57 +0000

Why does everyone make out the zeppelins always ran on hydrogen – they didn’t they ran on helium untill america stopped supplying germany with the helium it needed, this forced them to hydrogen, which the hindenburg wasn’t really designed to use.

By: Jay

Jay — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 20:07:15 +0000

I wonder how the durigables of the past dealt with the aerodynamic issues, and turbulence issues. I guess there was more dangers about them then we think.

Still I’d take a ride in an air ship just for the fun of it.

By: P. Jos

P. Jos — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:42:49 +0000

Great article! What a neat idea. But isn’t a football field a little big for a flying object? Is there anything else in the air that big? Can you play football in it?

By: Tom Birchmire

Tom Birchmire — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:41:41 +0000

Why do you writers have a compulsion to bring the Hindenburg into every article about airships when there hasn’t been hydrogen used in airships since the Hindenburg. Possibly you needed some troll bait filler as the actual facts are boring.

By: f.tuijn

f.tuijn — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 19:14:52 +0000

The remarks in this article are as foolish as the project they describe. A short range heavy lifter
should be a helicopter, probably designed by Mil.
Hindenburg took fifty passengers from Frankfurt to
Lakehurst, loading 7 tons of diesel fuel, 3.5 % of its mass. Three quarters of a century later we should be able to build safe airships fast enough to dodge all the bad weather and as thrifty.

By: Daniel Weinreb

Daniel Weinreb — Sat, 12 Jul 2008 11:30:12 +0000

On the other hand, having neutral buoyancy rather than floating upward ought to make it a lot easier to land. That’s always been a problem with airships.

I sure hope it works. Airships are just so cool!