Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-06-04
BACKGROUND OF EVENTS
BY PAUL Y. COLLINS.

| livered in 1924 as part of the war
settlement to the United States by its
German makers. When the ship reached
the landing field in the Washington
Navy Yard, she refused to perch on
! solid ground, or even to bow low enough
! for the scores of men on the earth to
seize her ropes and tie her down, until
| throttles were opened and vast
| amount of the precious helium was
dumped back to the sun, whence
it may have come. For quite a while
| it looked as though we in the airship
were doomed to walk the ceiling Of the
| sky like flies but, at the cost of oceans
| of heliun1, we at last regatned the earth.
With the new ships. such predicament
! will be avoided, for they are so ar
ranged that all the engines are inside
of the great envelope, and the shafts
are capable of being turned to kick
upward against the sky, when so needed
to aid gravity; or the shafts may turn
down to help kick the ship up against
gravity, mechanically supplementing
| the lift OF the gas. It will no longer
be necessary to waste the helium in
order to use it.
Helium is not the only gas that is re-
quired in the operation of an airShip;
helium only lifts the ship; it does not
propel it. Until recently the five en-
gines on the Los Angeles were operated
| with gasoline, like the engines of air
planes or automobiles.
| Germany has substituted ''fuel gas"
instead of gasoline. and calls it
"blaugas." named after its originator,
DR.. Blau. According to a pamphlet
written by Comdr. Garland Fulton Of
the United States Navy, the blaugas is
far less explosive than hydrogen, and 50
is preferable on that account.
Says Comdr. Fulton: Several months
| ago, the Bureau of Economics was re-
quested to locate in this country a gas
| having the required characteristics in
order to replenish the Graf zeppelin's
| fuel on her arrival in America. (She
was expected here this week but owing
to disabling breakdown has been de-
layed) Our first efforts we're abortive
because We tried to locate a 'blaugaS'
duplicating that planned for use in Ger
many. Several 'blaugas' samples were
procured but they were unstable, mcer-
| tain and unsatisfactory. We turned
then to the recently created and rapid
ly growing natural gas industry in the
United States, and there found a salts
factory and cheaper substitute gas-vir.
tually a vaporized gasoline. The
methane-ethane-pr series is being
| extensively proceSSed for industrial pur-
poses at various points and offers at
tractive possibilities as a source of fuel
| gas for airships in future. Ethane has
a density of 1.o3 and other character
iSticS that are satisfactory. CONNER
cially pure ethane would serve nicely
but was found to be expensive. In one
town in Oklahoma citizens are burning
In their stoves, at price Of so cents
thousand. just the sort of gas that is
required
However, that Oklahoma gas, while
| cheap at its source, is not cheap when
1t has to be compressed and transported,
but propane can be iquefied and carried
as liquid, and burned as gas. So the
experts are now considering for fuel a
| combination of propane liquefied, with
helium as a lifting gas; and it all has
the merit OF being made in America"
Helium has its uses aside from that
OF floating airshipS. although such uses
have not yet been developed to call for
great quantities. The total consump-
ton of hehum outside of airships
amounts to only 100000 cubic feet per
year-a trifling amount when 1t is re-
called that it takes more than 10000 900
feet to fill one of our new airshipS.
Not long ago. little blimp belonging
to our Navy accidentally ran into a
weather vane, and ripped a gas bag,
losing $4,000 cubic feet of helium, which
III years ago would nave cost $50 600 600.
Now that amount of helium is worth
about $3.50. 1t is predicted that the
market value will soon be reduced to
about 2 cents cubic foot, especially if
the new supply found in Utah proves
to be as bounteouS as reported. If,
however. science keeps pace with dis
covery, by finding new uses for it, more
rapidly than new supplies develop. the
price may not continue its downward
trend, any more than the Los Angeles
did in 1924 with its full load of helium.
Helium is insoluble in water, or even
in molten metals; it is useful therefore
in metallurgy. 1t is used in radio tubes
and in nautical instruments. It pre-
vents the trouble called "caiSSon bends"
with which deep-sea divers are afiicted
when they rise too rapidly from their
dives. 1t is useful in drying operations
but yet is too expensive to be practi-
cable for the laundry, though useful in
chemical operations 1t is the coolest
substance known, for it hquefies at $50
degrees Fahrenheit) below zero-with-
in 2 degrees of absolute zero" If
Comdr. Byrd were to spill some liquid
helium on an Antarctic iceberg, it would
be so much colder than the ice that the
ice would instantly boil. All of these
and certain other qualities yet too novel
TO be applied. will open new uses for
heliun in the very near future.
And America holds monopoly of it
yet. Don't give up the heliuml'
ido,xriahk. ta1o. hx pAul " dcakinnA