DBWI: What if airplanes were the only primary mode of aerial transport? (Zeppelin DBWI)

Let’s be frank about it hitting the Twin Towers with airships would have been useless. Even if they still used hydrogen as a lifting gas an airship has neither the mass nor the velocity to heavily damage a modern building whereas fully fueled aircraft did.
An airship would have bounced off. Badly damaged true but the end result would have been little worse than a bad car crash and a few broken windows in the towers.
 
Garrett-Cartoonist wrote:
Yeah, I remember that giant giving me nightmares as a kid.

Not me but then again I knew where they got the design from (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0050118/reviews) which was SUPPOSED to be scary but not “too” scary. Anyone who’s seen the movie and sequel gets chills when he stands up as the ‘shadows’ cast on his face harken back to the injuries in the second film. It’s really subtle but the big goofy grin and joke at the end are supposed to set you at ease. WHICH is why the places that dropped those last few seconds tend to be where kids were scared of the giant

Thekingsguard wrote:
We see the kinds of people who take blimps and zeppelins - pleasure cruisers, families, vacationers - join the business and government crowd in taking airplanes. They kind of split in OTL over the choice of comfort vs speed.

Me personally, I'm an odd duck who prefers planes for travel - maybe you have the spare time to putter about the air for a dozen hours, but me, give me a strong drink and a nap, and a plane is just as good, and I get to spend more time on the ground after.

Now see because of my background I flew a LOT on both depending on military whim. While the cargo planes tended to get “there” quicker but having to bundle up and find a ‘space’ to try and sleep in while bumping along in freezing temperatures, (unless you’re right near the heater outlet then your roasting) but the rides over in 14 to 20 hours. The airship pretty much has to have a dedicated “passenger” area, (usually a “passenger pod” about the size of a city bus and almost as crowded) which at least have some bunks and entertainment be it movie, TV or such. In both cases you have box lunches and whatever snacks, food and drink you managed to pack aboard in your kit. GETTING to your kit however :)

I remember going to Desert Shield where I packed my kit next to my seat and in the end we had to stack everyone’s kits in that area so I had this little ‘room’ all to myself. 8 hours in I woke and realized two things… I wasn’t actually able to access my kit since I didn’t have the room to move AND I had to go to the can and couldn’t get out of the ‘room’ as the walls were too tall! Luckily we missed an in-flight refueling and had to land to take on fuel which got us a 12 hour crew rest and I made sure to pack things differently the next time. On the way home they chartered a commercial airship which took almost three days, (weather and other factors) but which I never HAD to access my kit as it was full service! Having ridden both Tactical and Strategic Cargo Airships at the very least you can get up and move around more than on similar mission aircraft but if you have no passenger pod the trip is LOOOOONG and BOOOOORRRRING and you wish you were on an airplane.

Peg Leg Pom wrote:
An airship would have bounced off. Badly damaged true but the end result would have been little worse than a bad car crash and a few broken windows in the towers.

That’s what the Airship industry says anyway but there’s a lot of factors involved and I’ve seen several simulations where there’s some severe damage to the building’s exterior and fires inside the building but getting the results you got from aircraft impacts is almost impossible.

In fact we’ve got a similar historic data set with the Empire State Building and the B-25 aircraft that hit in in 1945, (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1945_Empire_State_Building_B-25_crash) all 14 in the aircraft were killed on impact whereas less than a year later in 1946 an Army Expediter Semi-Rigid Transport hit 40 Wall Street (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/40_Wall_Street#1946_plane_crash) where five out of the 15 on-board were killed in the initial impact and as the LTA collapsed into the street. Whereas the B-25 was moving in excess of 200mph and severely damaged the building the Expediter travelling at its maximum speed of around 80mph broke windows and damaged the brick and mortar facade with the biggest damage being the port engine breaking free and crashing through the wall into an office.

Like airships don’t handle storms well they don’t deal with impact well due to their design.

You know one thing I forgot to mention in addition to engines, materials and other advances that gave the airship such a boost and that struck me suddenly while watching a ConUS cargo lifter making an approach to Ogden Airport yesterday. I was watching it approach when I noted that it was both side-slipping, (cross-wind) and had all its control planes in maximum lift configuration and it struck me… I can’t for the life of me remember who first put forward “canard” elevators on an airship but the amount of control authority you gain is HUGE compared to just aft control surfaces.

Take a historic example of the Akron’s cross-continental flight. The entire reason its tail was damaged was because it had to fly through a canyon rather than over it because it could not vent the expensive and rare helium. It had to clear a section of the canyon and so went to about 6 degrees ‘nose up’ by using the aft elevators which since they were more used to the training ship Los Angeles was a routine maneuver. But the thing to keep in mind this works by pushing the tail DOWN first and foremost and the longer lower fin of the Akron smashed into the canyon floor almost severing it!

As I noted the subsequent investigation shocked Congress as it was found the US supply of helium was barely sufficient for the needs of ONE Navy airship and a few small Army and commercial LTA’s and neither the production nor storage capacity was sufficient for future or projected needs. They were horrified to learn that the USS Los Angles which had been decommissioned and turned over to Goodyear for experimental commercial operations was operating only with a mixed use of helium and hydrogen due to the shortage and that the Army could only fly on or the other of its two semi-rigid airships. Heck the British were highly interested in purchasing helium but there was simply none to be had. Even the Hindenburg had originally been designed to use helium but had to settle for hydrogen. In the end Congress mandated and authorized funding for expanded helium production and storage but also declared it an “strategic material” which quickly meant we’d sell some to England but none to anyone else and US needs always came first.

Anyway I digress because what was likely more important in the short run is that both Akron and Macon’s tails were reinforced over the incident and shortened in length but at some point in the next year or so both had forwards canards added to allow them to perform stable rise and descent maneuver without the “tail-drop/nose-rise” that had caused the accident in the first place but I seem to recall that someone else installed them first and I want to say it was the R-2 or R-3 in England and my search-fu is failing me.

It makes all sorts of sense in retrospect and the obvious comparison between submarine and airship operations was obviously there but easier I supposed to see once the operational pressure of “prove it or die” went away with the Helium support act. So as I said watching that approach and landing reminded me of an aspect we missed.

Then again I’m also in an area where the weather can be tricky to the extreme. Watching an tourist Blimp ‘backing’ at full forward power, (60mph versus an 80mph head wind) across Ogden to an emergency landing near the Great Salt Lake is not an uncommon occurrence.

Randy
 
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