Flying Dutchman wrote:Zeppelins could be profitable and affordable. Quite some research is done in other major urban areas concerning operating zeppelins with positive results...however since the Hindenberg, nobody dares to go in one anymore...
Now we are talking my area of expertise!
The Hindenburg, and all other Lighter than Air flying machines at that time, apart from those operated by the US Navy...used hydrogen as a lifting gas. Its cheap and easy to produce, but has a nasty side effect of blowing up if mixed with air and catching a spark.
The US had, and still has, the monopoly on helium. This is inert and does not react with anything. The problem is, its hideously expensive to produce. They used it to lift their airships, but faced other technical problems with gas expansion and condensation inside the hulls. They were successful for the time and one, The Akron. even had a squadron of small fighter aircraft housed inside that were launched and recovered using a swing out trapeze under the ship.
The old rigid airships used a light duralmin skeleton to contain the gas bags and a aluminium dust doped canvas outer skin to make them streamlined. In order to carry sufficient load and fuel as well as engines, they were absolutely huge. To give you an idea, you could park a Boeing 747 Jumbo under the tail fin of the Hindenburg and it would not get wet if it rained! It required 7 MILLION cubic feet of hydrogen to lift itself and cargo.
Unfortunately, to build a ship of this type today would be prohibitively expensive. Modern airships are much smaller. the largest only carries 12 passengers and they use a non rigid bladder filled with helium and a cabin slung underneath to hold the now much lighter engines.
A 12 seater airship will set you back US$450,000 per month on a lease complete with a sizeable number of crew. The hardest thing to find...are pilots. There are actually more qualified astronauts in the world today than airship pilots.
There have been rumours of an airship visiting Dubai for years, but no-one will pick up the tab. Despite their operational abilities they have an achilles heel: weather. If it is too windy, it is impossible to launch and land them and they require very expensive custom built hangarage in severe conditions. Nature has been the single thing that has caused more airship accidents than warfare or human error.
Nice idea, but operationally and economically unfeasible.
Knight of the Air