The Monmouth inquirer. [volume] (Freehold, N.J.) 1865-1933, 1924-09-04
AMERICAN zR-3
RIDES OUT STORM
New DirigibIe of United States
Navy ManeuverS in AirsMore
Than Two Hours.
WILL CROSS ATLANTIC SOON
One Motor Fails to Work-Broken
crankshaft the Cause, but Another
Engine Can Be Quickly Installed
American Officers Aboard.

Friedrichshafen, Germany. $3.50
Wednesday afternoon the ZR3. built
here for the American Government,
left her gigantic hangar for her first
trial flight around Lake Constance.
For many weeks the weather has
been stormy, but just as the great
ship emerged over the meadow out
side the Zeppelin works it seemed to
brighten.
The engineers and their assistants
had already taken their seats in the
five gondolas containing the motors.
The large cabin in front was filed
with about forty Zeppelin employees
as passengers. In the foremost gon-
dola were DR.. Eckener, chief COM
mander; Captain Planning, second
in command, and six Americans, Cap
tain George Steele, Lieut.. Comman-
der Kraus, Major Kennedy and Lieu
tenants Fulton and Schmidt and Jack
Fulton, Construction Superintendent
of the Aeronautical Department of
the Goodrich Rubber Company. Sew
eral hundred Zeppelin employees
were clinging to the ropes suspended
from the ships body to prevent q
premature ascent.
Finally DR.. Eckener gave the order
to release her Immediately the mo-
tors started and the colossal ship rose
majestically, discharging immense
quantities of water that she carried
as ballast. The several thousand
spectators who had collected outside
the gates of the factory broke into
cheers, congratulating one another
for having lived to witness once more
the great spectacle of a first fight"
once so familiar to natives of Lake
Constance region.
In their eagerness the spectators
had taken no notice of the dark
clouds that had gathered in the west
and now approached rapidly. The
ZR-S had not been in the air more
than five minutes when she sailed
right into a furious cloudburst. But
she held her course as though she
had weathered hundred storms, and
as she rose higher and higher, with
her nose pointed directly against the
furious winds and rain, her huge
dark-painted body was hardly dis
tinguishable from the clouds that
ragged above her.
She circled once more over her
birthplace, and then she took north
erly course, evidently trying to avoid
the black clouds thu sIlIl hung be-
tween Friedrichshafen and the city
of Constance. Half an hour loter,
when the rain had ceased, the airship
could be observed in the far distance,
circling over Lake Constance where
she was awaited by Prince Max of
Baden and multitude of spectators.
At o'clock in the evening the roar
of her engines announced her return,
When the great gray body emerged
from the cloudy sky it described beau
tiful evolutions over the lake, with an
elegance and apparent ease that testi-
fed to the ability of the men who
handled her half mile in the air. In
descending to her hangar the ZR-3
showed the perfection of her steer
ing apparatus.
DR.. Eckener, after landing, said
LudL uS was ooSA0hOA WIZ
the reversible motors and roller bear
ings that constituted an innovation
in the construction Of the ZR-3, and
that he had no fault to find with any
of the apparatus, except one motor,
which had not proved satisfactory.
Regarding her speed he could not say
much after this short trip; but he
thought, judging from experience,
that the ZR-3 would surpass all her
predecessors.
The Director General of the Yep
pelin Works said he could not remem-
Der a single predecessor of the pres
emit airship that had behaved so well
on it's first trip.
Washington.-Imm inspec-
i