Evening star., 1939-05-21
Demise of Military Dirigibles
Seems Inevitable for America
Vulnerable Because of Their Own Bulk, Thew
Resemble Prehistoric Monsters That
Yielded to Nature
BY Joseph II. Baird.

President Roosevelt's decision to aban-
don plans for the construction of a new
Navy dirigible marks the end, many OBJ
servers here believe, of these giants of
the sky in Americas aerial arsenal.
Like the mammoths of historic
times, the dirigible has proved vulnerable
to the forces of nature because of its own
hugeness. One after one, the military
powers of the world have abandoned it
after a succession of tragedies. Ger
many, alone of the great nations, now has
single large airship and, ironically
enough, the two at Friedricshafen can
not be operated safely because the
United States has monopoly on helium,
the only known non-explosive lifting
gas.
The experience of all the powers ex-
cept Germany with large lighter-than-
air craft has been tragic. France lost
the Dlxmude over the Mediterranean.
Britain's R-10l exploded over France
with great loss of life And the United
States lost each of the three big
dirigibles it built-the Shenandoah, the
Akron and the Macon-in disasters.
They Are Big Targets.
All the American ships were lost in
storms. But aside from their vulner-
ability to high winds, new military de-
velopments have created doubt of the
usefulness of dirigibles in wartime
Modern anti-aircraft artillery is effective
against these big targets up to an alti-
tude of 3 miles. They would have no
hope OF escape from fast pursuit ships
with speed of nearly 300 miles per
|, hour. And the range of bombing and
scout planes has been so extended re-
Gently that they can carry out most of
the missions for which the drigible was
designed
Too, economy is an important con-
sideration in choosing between dirigibles
and airplaneS. For the cost Of a ship
like the Akron or Macon-around So
500 000-15 giant bombers of the Flying
Fortress" type can be built. These ships
have a speed of nearly $50 miles per
hour. as compared with 80 or 80 for the
airship. They present a much smaller
target to anti-aircraft guns than the
dirigible and have a better chance of
escape from pursuit planes. 1t is highly
unlikely that in carrying out bombing
mission the entire flight of Is planes
would be lost. But if the airship is shot
down. that represents a loss in money
equal to the entire squadron of planes.
Despite the tragic history of the Zep-
pelin and the new military factors now
working against it, the Navy Department
was ready once more to experiment with
new and smaller type of ship. about
half the size of the Akron and Macon.
But construction engineers informed the
President that this size was even less
safe than the larger. This advice sealed
Mr.. Roosevelts decision to abandon the
dirigible program altogether.
A Commercial Future, However.
The history of mans effort to perfect
a safe and reliable lighter -than-air craft
is packed with human drama, sacrifice
and courage Nor has this necessarily
been wasted. Experts believe that the
dirigible still may have bright future
in commercial traffic. Germany, until
the Hindenburg disaster proved the peril
of using hydrogen. carried on a highly
successful service to America which may
some day be resumed. But, as a military
weapon, most experts believe that the
dirigible has entered its twilight zone
Germany, largely as the result of Count
zeppelins persistent and intelligent re-
search and experiments, pioneered in the
development of the dirigible. Even be-
fore the World War commercial lines
were operating ships in Germany.
Before the war the German general
staff was skeptical of the Zeppelins
military usefulness, but under the stress
of war it turned to support it. Some
90 dirigibles were built in Germany dur
ing the war and carried out a series of
spectacular raids on England in 1915
and 1916. About 1900 persons were
killed in London by air bombs and the
dirigibles inflicted wide damage on
property.
Finally the development of effective
anti-aircraft and the increasing number
of British defense planes made bomb
ing more dangerous for the Zeppelins
than it had been earlier, and in the
last year of the war these raids virtually
ceased. A number of ships were shot
down and few of them lasted more than
few months in service Twenty was
the largest number Germany had in
commission at any one time.
Captive Ships Reveal Secrets.
Neither Great Britain nor France Was
able to organize lighter -than-air pre-
gram during the World War. except for
observation blimps Indeed the tech
nique of successful Zeppelin production
vas a German monopoly. However,
during the war two of the German ships
were forced down-one in France, an
other in England-without serious dam
age to either, and were closely studied
by British and French engineers.
Britain's lighter-than-ai program did
not get seriously under way until 1875,
when the R-100 and R-101 were begun
These ships were patterned on German
models, although British engineers in
troduced certain improvements in de-
tail. Grandiose plans were made for
an empire air service and mooring masts
were erected in Canada and Egypt The
R100 made a successful round trip to
Canada. Shortly afterward, however,
the R-101, en- route to India, fell in