Zeppelin ride pics

[coldplugs]

Recently returned from a few weeks out west (CO,UT,NV,CA,ID) where we rode on a <span style="font-style: italic">Zeppelin</span>!. The company is German and was partially funded by money originally provided thru the original Zeppelin company.

It's an interesting machine and far advanced from the old days. Here are a few photos...

The passenger loading process is different from an airplane. The airship is held down by three ground crew members at the nose and acts like a huge weathervane, always turning into the wind. The short landing stairs have wheels and are attached to the gondola. Passengers have to sort of chase it and hop on. They let one person off at a time, and then one gets on. (It's only slightly heavier than air at times and if everyone got off it'd want to rise. They attach a hose and add water ballast if they want to get everyone off at once. At the end of the day they tether it to a mast truck.

There's an engine on each side and one in the stern. The side engines can rotate to direct thrust straight up to about 30 deg down. The airship usually flies heavier than air and stays aloft using the engines. The fuel tanks were not very full when we rode and the pilot told me we had about 60 lbs negative buoyancy.

The flight was from Moffett Field in Mountain View CA. Moffett is no longer a Navy facility and is now used by NASA.

Not visible here but the ship is flown using a small joystick.

View out the stern.

Part of Stanford University. Great photo platform because of the huge windows.

Note the open window. Since we were only flying at about 40 mph you could stick your head out.

Pac-Man?

Blimp hangers.

Landing approach. The pilot (we were told) is the only female lighter-than-air pilot in the US. (No, <span style="font-style: italic">she</span> isn't, the aircraft is). The landing was imperceptible. They docked it to the "mast truck" after our flight. The docking is controller by a ground crew member with a remote joystick.

The dirigible is a "Zeppelin NT", of which 4 exist. Apparently the company had just received an order for several new ones from Goodyear!

 

[Gliderman8]

Very cool pics John.
It looks like the Zeppelin is operated by only the pilot and no co-pilot.
Do you know what your air speed was?

 

[AN5Sprite]

Very cool, but did you quote Randy? :thumbsup:

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[PAUL161]

Was in a Blimp squadron, ZP-753, Lakehurst, NJ in 1955. We had K bags, single wheel underneath. Towed sonar, (fish), on a long cable along the coast in the Atlantic. The Nan ships were larger and had radar domes on them. Only thing I ever saw where you could get sea sick in other than a ship. :laugh: PJ

Interesting note, there are only two certified woman S-bag pilots, one in the US and one in Europe.

 

[MadRiver]

You lucky so-and-so! Riding in a zeppelin has been a huge dream of mine for ages!

 

[coldplugs]

Bill, I'm sure they'd be happy to sell you a ticket! It's expensive but no more so than a lot of airline flights these days.

Elliot - speed was generally about 40mph. No co-pilot, although the flight attendant sat in that seat at takeoff & landing.

Paul - I doubt seasickness is a problem for a commercial ride like this since they cancel frequently due to weather. On this trip, one couple had been cancelled 3 times before. I suspect the Navy had a different attitude...

And Steve - yes. That was my reaction exactly.

 

[NutmegCT]

What a great set of pictures. Airships are always on the "smooth" side. There have been, however, some not-so-comfortable zeppelin situations:

Tom

 

[DrEntropy]

VERY neat, John! Great pix!

 

[martx-5]

Great pics. I looked up the Zeppelin NT on Wikipedia to find out if it was a rigid airship as the originals Zeppelins were. Turns out that it's a semi-rigid ship...sort half way between an original rigid Zeppelin and a blimp.

 

[PAUL161]

I doubt seasickness is a problem for a commercial ride like this since they cancel frequently due to weather. On this trip, one couple had been canceled 3 times before.<span style="color: #FF0000"> I suspect the Navy had a different attitude...</span> As always!

A unique thing about the military blimps is, they could stay up for hours at a time, we even had a galley on board the smaller K bags. One of the crew was un officially designated the cook and it was nothing to have steak and eggs, or whatever on the grill depending if we were out in the morning or at night. Blimp crews were a close knit happy bunch and were usually very happy with their job. I'm amazed and usually get a good laugh at what some people say about how blimps were constructed, how they fly, what they used for skin, etc, etc. Just proves, if it's in print, you believe it.