Delaware City press. (Delaware City, Del.) 1913-19??, 1913-08-22
Great Vessel for War, but Price
Is Prohibitive.
Difficulties Confronting Great Britain
In Organizing an Effective Fleet
of Airships-PiIots Are Very
Hard to Find.

London.-For some time past 1t has
been very difficult to make people
think in anything but terms of dread
naughts and superdreadnaughts. NOW
however, the topic of thought, SO to
speak, is slowly but perceptibly veer-
Ing, and we are beginning to think IN
terms Of dirigibles. Almost every pa
per that comes to hand has an article
In It pointing out the great value OF
the rigid airship and the necessity OF
building a large number Of this type
~ aerial craft. There can be no
doubt as to our need Of this class Of
air vessel. but few persons rsaii2e the
extreme costliness of building me
rigid dirigIbIe and keeping It in an
efficient state. The price of zeppe-
lin is about $4,000 sterling, and
hangar to hold two of these vessels
costs about 100000 Then there are
repairs, gas. wages and hundred
and one other things which necessi'
tate large running account to meet
them.
To builS a fleet Of forty dirigibles,
which we should have to do to en-
able us to get on even terms with the
aerial squadrons of other countries,
would cost us about e200O,OOO, and
then hangers must be provided for
all of these airships. which means the
expenditure of another G2,O00,000 at
least
Where these air vessels are to be
built and how long they would take
to construct are also matters of I'M
portance, seeing that we have not as
yet turned out any really satisfactory
airshlps Of large size. Arrangements
TOO have been completed in Germany
whereby the same of Zeppelin and
SchutteLanz dirigibles to foreign gov
ernments is prohibited
Then. even supposing that we could
purchase forty of these aerial cruisers
In the space Of a year, we should hnd
considerable difficulty in obtaining
pilots qualified to sail them. The off
cial list published by the Federation
Aerunautique Internationale shows
that. up to Dec. 81, 1912, thirty-twt
aeronauts (balloonsl and eleven air
ship pilots certificates we're granted
60 persons in Great Britain.
There is no gainsaying the fact that
as compared with any other kind o
aerial craft, the rigid dirigible is tn,
nir vessel of today, In carrying capac
ity and radius of action. in its pow
ors of remaining steady in the al
and flying noiselessly aided by til
wind. the rigid airship has no riva
II has of course. its disadvantages
its immense bulk. which makes il
very Noticeable object in the sky an
It's unwieldiness. which necessitate
q host OF attendants to grapple with
when it leaves the earth and when
aliphts The Zeppelin airships to'
are extremely heavy The lifting CT
pacity Of Zeppelin L is twenty-seve
tons, but owing to its own gre;
weight its useful load is only sou
seven tons
As regards the construction Of Il
rigid airship. in this type OF air We
sol the shape of its envelope is III
dependent OF internal gas pressur
= huge framework, made Of aluminu
IN the case of Zeppelins. is provide
with from seventeen to twenty Sc
arate gas chambers Attached to Il
framework is a keel which, in additi
10 serving other purposes, affor
communication between the two ca
the latter carrying the motors, gun
bomb dropping appliances. etc. T
propellers. of which there are 70
are fixed to the frame above the ca
The framework is covered with II
bered cloth. The Schutte-Lanz d
gible has a wooden framework, as /
also the French rigid LIE Spiess,