Why Blimps and Airships Died Out - and How They Might Make a Comeback

Written by Drew Reed, Published on February 9, 2015 by CityMetric

Many years ago, long before the era of massive international airports, online ticketing agencies, and pesky pre-boarding security inspections, the airship was going to be the future.

Needless to say, that didn't quite work out. Today's skies are ruled by jumbo jets, helicopters, and the occasional drone or two. But a recent invention may help these long forgotten flying machines to reclaim their rightful place in aviation history - or at least carve out a niche.

"Airship" is a term for all motorised lighter-than-air craft, including blimps (which have inflatable air compartments) and zeppelins (which have rigid ones). They first came into existence after the development of the internal combustion engine, though a few daring aviators tried to pilot airships powered by steam engines. The first modern airship, the Zeppelin LZ1, took flight in 1900 - three years before the Wright Brothers made their famous flight.

Due to their relative cost effectiveness and longer range, airships were seen as the more attractive form of air travel in the early 20th century. They also played a key role as military aircraft, and were used for bombings in World War I. By the 1930s, luxury airships were whisking well-to-do passengers across the Atlantic Ocean, and were considered a technological marvel. They even had an influence on the urban landscape; it's rumoured that the spire of the Empire State Building was designed to be converted into an airship dock.

It wasn't the deadliest airship disaster - that honour goes to the British-built R101, which crashed in France in 1930 - but it was perhaps the most dramatic, and even though the majority of the Hindenburg's passengers survived, airship travel became an instant pariah. It seems likely that airships would have been phased out anyway due to improvements in airplane technology which allowed for much shorter travel times - but the Hindenburg disaster ended the era of passenger airships virtually overnight.

Since then, the use of airships has been extremely limited, as technological advances allowed airplanes and helicopters to dominate aviation. Though blimps played a useful surveillance role in World War II, airships today are mostly used for overhead photography at sports events, and as massive flying billboards. Today, the Van Wagner group, an airship organisation, estimates that there are only 25 blimps currently operating around the world; there are even fewer zeppelins.

But all this is about to change, if Igor Pasternak has his way. As a young man growing up in Ukraine, Pasternak's love of airships led him to study engineering in search of the latest breakthrough in zeppelin technology. That breakthrough would ultimately come in the form of the COSH system, though only after he emigrated to California in the early gos to escape a post-Cold War economic crash.

The COSH - Control of Static Heaviness - system works by rapidly compressing helium into storage tanks, making the airship heavier than air. While conventional airships take on air to descend, they must still dedicate most of the space in the helium envelope to actually storing the helium itself. That makes the landing process more difficult and dangerous, and means they can only land at larger landing areas much larger than the size of the airships themselves, and that come with specialized ground teams.

By contrast, the COSH system allows much more of the envelope to be emptied of helium during landing, making the airship much heavier. This could potentially allow airships to land on any flat area large enough for them to enter without the need for ground teams, increasing versatility and reducing costs.

This ability won't do much to shake up passenger airlines, since airships will still be considerably slower. But Pasternak's company, Worldwide Aeros Corp., is hoping its new airship will bring major changes to freight shipping.

It's currently working on a prototype of the Aeroscraft, a new airship capable of hauling up to 66 tons, with a cruising speed of 120 knots and a range of over 5,000 miles; there are plans, too, for a larger version that can haul 250 tons. It will also be roughly three times as fuel efficient as shipping in airplanes. While it'll still be less efficient than land or sea shipping, company representatives are hoping its landing capabilities will give it an advantage in hauling cargo to remote areas with little infrastructure.

"The Aeroscraft will be a breakthrough for cargo shipping, filling an important gap between current air shipping and land-based delivery," says Aeros representative John Kiehle. "Since it will be so easy to land, it will also be able to provide needed assistance in disaster relief situations, where existing infrastructure is knocked out."

And though it won't bring major changes to passenger air travel, Kiehle says that the airship may have some limited passenger applications. "It can serve as a sort of airborne cruise ship for tourist trips, as well as potentially serving more practical passenger routes in rural areas," he says.

Aeroscraft has hit a few snags in the development process. Pasternak initially secured funding from the US military for an airship project using the COSH system in 2005. This was later cut, though the military continued funding the group in other projects, allowing them to move forward with a prototype.