Major Set Back for Professor's Hydorgen Airships

Maybe you remember Prof. Barry Prentice, the Professor that had a plan to build Hydrogen Airships for cargo hauling in Canada's North. Well, unfortunately his business venture had a major set back, the Hanger they were keeping the Airships has been destroyed due to a Sand Storm (Full Story.) Estimated damages are between a half million to a million dollars.

Airship hangers have been notoriously finicky throughout history. The Aeroscraft was destroyed by the hanger collapsing just a few years ago, and in the past major Airship endeavors have ended in ruin because of fires and other major malfunctions in airship hangers all through the First Golden Age of Airships.

The conspiracy theorist in me has always found it a little odd that Airship Hangers seem to be so fraught with failure, when all they are functionally is a massive room. However the more logical explanation is that there is something fundamentally wrong with the way we construct airship hangers. In this case, I'm sure there is a solution to building much more reliable Hangers for airships then what we are doing now, Moffett Field has had no know problems from collapses I do believe, maybe it's a more structurally sound design?

HAV update July 12th

"The biggest disappointment of this Farnborough show must surely be the non-appearance of the Airlander 10. The huge hybrid airship remains confined inside the hangar at Cardington from which it was due to emerge and fly last April. Its maker, Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV, Hall 4 Stand 36) told AIN that no single problem had caused the delay. “We’ve erred on the side of caution, as we’re the first of a new type,” said a spokesman." Full Story

Transition FAA Go ahead, Flying Cars are finally here?

The Terrafugia Transition, the flying Car that seems like it would never come, has just gotten the go ahead from the FAA for an increased weight carrying capacity and stall speed while still maintaining it's light sport status, this will allow it to be a street legal vehicle with modern safety standards, while also being an Airplane with modern aviation safety standards and state of the art equipment.

In related news NASA has unveiled it's plans to Jump start electric General Aviation, by building their own electric aircraft.

These steps are showing a very bright future for a revitalization in Aviation as a whole, not just Airships. I believe Airships and fixed wing aircraft are not going to be in competition this time around, but rather the relationship will be symbiotic.

The Terrafugia, really opens the door for a whole new picture on how the average person views aviation. Now you no longer need a Hanger if you want to have an Airplane, making the initial price and maintenance the only main concerns.

Terrafugia is going to be a forerunner to a very probable new market of roadable aircraft which is very likely to surpass the general aviation market as it stands. The future where we take a flying car to work may finally be arriving.

This has a very good possibility of changing peoples perceptions about aviation in general and leading to a larger willingness to explore new possibilities, which benefits Airships.

Airships are Coming to Battlefield 1

As we are still waiting for Airlander 10 to fly, some hype for Airships is being generated by the next Battlefield game from DICE. Battlefield 1 will take place in WWI, and Zeppelins are going to be implemented as a major gimmick to get people interested in the game. I generally stay away from games made by EA, but I must admit having a massive zeppelin in a game is something that gets my interest peaked enough to pay attention for a little bit.

Airlanders New Promotional Video

Bruce Dickinson interview by AVweb

AVWeb did an interview with Iron Maiden and Airship Geek Bruce Dickinson. Check it out.

Airship Happenings - Iron Maiden, HAV Funding Goals and more.

A lot has been happening lately in the World OF Airships (TM)... ha, got to it before you Wargaming!


The first big thing on my Radar is Iron Maidens Empire of the Clouds. Which I learned recently is a tribute song written by Bruce Dickenson about the R-101 Airship made by the Brits. The R-101 was pushed by politics rather then good engineering and on it's maiden voyage crashed in France killing 48 or the 51 people on broad.

This included big wigs pushing the Airship program in the UK. Eerily mirroring these events was the USS. Akron Accident that happened a few years latter off the coast of Florida. A lot of the Big Wigs in the U.S. pushing for the Lighter then Air Program died as well in that accident.


In other News, HAV has raised a large some of money as part of their crowd funding campaign. These funds should insure that Airlander 10 will be seen flying for at lest 200 hours over the UK this summer as part of the certification process.

The great thing about Airships is that once you get them flying they promote themselves, and Airlander 10 has the words "Airlander" written across it's sides for that very reason.


Also worth noting are these weird little drone blimps that I can't help but chuckle at the way it picks things up.

There was also an Interview with Mike Kendrick, the man who will be buying Lockheeds Airships in the near future.