Australium

## Summary

Australium is a lifting gas first discovered in Australia, and found in its highest concentrations there. The gas can also be found across the world in underground gas deposits. The gas is primarily used as a lifting gas in airships, due to its lifting power of 20.51pounds/cubic meter (26.83lbs/cubic yd).

## Discovery and History

### Discovery

The gas was first discovered by British coal miners in Australia, mining in the Great Dividing Range in March 1889. The miners noted a faint squealing noise coming from a hole they initially though to be an area of porous water-filled stone. Shortly after it was noticed that multiple people were having difficulties breathing. The mineshaft was shortly thereafter evacuated. Two chemists from Canberra arrived at the mine two weeks later, and, initially thought the gas to be pure hydrogen. Upon taking a sample, the scientists discovered that it was not in fact hydrogen, but a new element, which they coined Australium. The gas was contained in glass jars carefully sealed with rubber to contain the tiny gas.

The knowledge soon reached the United Kingdom, and chemists there requested samples of the gas. In July 1889, the HMS Notable, a Nelson Class Cruiser, departed from Hobart in July of 1889, heading to Britain. the ship was carrying ten one-gallon jars of the new "Australium". The jars reached the Royal society of Chemistry on the twenty-fifth of July. They studied the newfound gas, and found that the samples the Australian chemists had sent, were not comprised purely of the new element, but instead a mixture with nitrogen gas and hydrogen. The hydrogen content was diminutive though nitrogen proved to be more substantial. The gas was cooled to a point where the nitrogen and hydrogen condensed into a liquid. The greatest purity of australium the researchers were able to achieve by this method was around 70%. This left the chemists with near-pure australium gas, which was discovered to have a large lifting capacity. They researched this after noted the difficulty of containing the gas, and praised the Australian researchers on their rubber sealed mason jars.

### Early Economic Development

Aviation researchers and enthusiasts in England reached out to the Chemical Society requesting samples of the gas. Fulfilling this, a relatively new Liverpool based company, the Marvin-Frederick Line, launched two dedicated cargo ships bound for Australia in August 1889. The ships had been constructed a year prior, and primarily served Mediterranean transport from Egypt to England. The ships carried manufactured items and machinery to Australia. Previously the line had primarily served to freight gold from the colony to England. This trip, the two ships were planned to be carrying australium as well.

The British may have been getting ahead of themselves though, for the infrastructure in Australia to extract the gas wasn't yet constructed. Owners of the small, Penrith based coal company Harvey and Sons Mining, found themselves with access to the only known supply of Australium gas. Upon the arrival of the two Marvin-Frederick ships and a conference between British aviators and the coal executives, the company, with a loan from multiple aviation inventors, purchased two oil pumpjacks to be repurposed to mine the gas. In October 1889, engineers from a local oil firm began drilling a pipe to the Australium gas reserve. On November 17, 1889, the pump jack began operating, and the first barrel of unrefined Australium was extracted from the south Blue Mountains. Harvey and Sons were consistently pressured by the shipping line to expedite extraction of the gas. A second location nearby was selected for the second pump jack, which was operating by November 28.

### Industrial Explosion (1889-1899)

By early December Harvey and Sons had extracted two-hundred cubic-meters of crude australium, which were loaded onto the two Marvin-Frderick Ships, which departed shortly after, on December 12, 1889. While the shipping company and Harvey and Sons were mining their australium, word spread not just around Australia, but around the world. Aviation researchers in England, having successfully refined the gas to 68% australium, loaded balloons with it in a similar manor to hydrogen before. German engineers soon learned of the news, and the Zeppelin company purchased eight-hundred gallons of the gas from an Australian entrepreneur in 1890. The Harvey and Sons company. along with a few others, continued extracting the gas to feed the, albeit limited, demand in Europe. In 1891 Ferdinand von Zeppelin ran experiments regarding the refining of australium. He wrote of his concept for a large airship, with self contained gas-cells and a frame, much larger and capable of propulsion than a ballon as had been previously experimented with. Von Zeppelin reached an Australium purity of around 85% in 1892, shortly thereafter he published his idea for a rigid airship in March.

This publication and it's gaining tract with intellectuals around the globe saw revitalized interest in extracting australium. Von Zeppelin then failed to get traction with the German Government, and production stagnated until 1896, when Ferdinand gave a lecture on steerable airships to the Association of German Engineers who funded and promoted his idea. The development of an australium, combustion engine powered-airship began in 1896, and spurred demand for australium from the Harvey and Sons Company, who was by now only operating one of its australium pumpjacks. The company supplied the gas for Zeppelins tests, which resulted in a functional, steerable airship by 1898. This development rejuvenated interest in air-development and australium gas. Engineers from Britain, France, Italy and the United States all began designing airships by early 1899. Multiple prospectors not just around Australia but the world began searching and drilling for australium. Harvey and Sons company reopened its second pump jack and built five more. By August 1899, Harvey and Sons Coal was extracting one-hundred-fifteen cubic meters of australium per day from its five pump jack locations. The Marvin-Frederick Line built a new ship specifically designed for transporting the gas in 1896, having a sealed steel container which held large quantities of the gas, instead of in separate steel barrels, each of which was required to be rubber sealed. This design, the RMS Australium, proved too costly to build for the quantity of australium being exported from Australia, but was kept in use until 1907.

The development of airships around the world generally created an industry around australium around the globe, with companies extracting the material from Africa, America, the Middle East and the Orient. Refineries of the gas were constructed in Europe and America, though notable the Northeast and Northwest USA, which remain the centres of australium refining to this day.