FlightGlobal.com
Home
Premium
Archive
Video
Images
Forum
Atlas
Blogs
Jobs
Shop
RSS
Email Newsletters
You are in:
Home
Aviation History
1925
1925 - 0580.PDF
SEPTEMBER 10, 1925 THE "SHENANDOAH" DISASTER BY the loss of the U.S. Naval rigid airship " Shenandoah,"or Z.R.I, and some 14 lives, the progress of aeronautics, particularly as regards the development of the lighter-than-air class, has received a severe blow. As might be expected, this catastrophe has resulted in the usual outcry from certainquarters, " Scrap all airships." We think, however, a calm and unprejudiced review of the facts of the case—so far asthey have come to light—do not by any means establish once and for all that the lighter-than-air craft as a class wasat fault, but rather that the blame for disaster must be attributed to " circumstances over which one has no control."combined, it would seem, with a certain " avoidable accident " element. The " Shenandoah," which is of the Zeppelin L.33 class,was designed by the U.S. Bureau of Naval Aeronautics, and was built at Lakehurst, N.J., in 1923, since when she hascarried out many successful and notable flights. On Sep- tember 2 the airship left Lakehurst with a crew of 42 officersand men for the purpose of making an extended tour to the middle West as far as Minneapolis, during which it was Zachary Lansdowne, U.S.N., being instantly killed. Mean-while, the nose of the hull, relieved of the weight of the control car, shot skywards and, with seven men clingingto the framework, proceeded on an erratic flight, balloon-like, for nearly an hour, with lengths of wire and girder trailingbehind it. It rose to nearly 8,000 ft. before it commenced to descend. As the control car broke away one of the crew,Lieut. Anderson, only just managed to grasp a girder of the hull and pull himself up into the broken nose. Even then hewas in a most perilous position, and it was only by the efforts of one of his companions, who lassoed him with a rope, thathe was able to get into a position of greater safety. As the nose descended to lower levels it was carried acrosscountry at nearly 30 m.p.h., and eventually, after colliding with trees and other obstacles, came to rest at the town ofSharon, about 12 miles from the spot where the ship broke in two. One of the seven, Rigger John McCarthy, wasthrown heavily to the ground and was badly hurt, but the others managed to escape from the wreckage without seriousinjury—these were Col. Chalmers Hall (Army Observer), The " Shenandoah " moored to the s.s. " Patoka expected she would pass over about eleven States and visitmany big towns. Having successfully crossed the Alleghenies mountains by moonlight, she was reported over Wheeling,West Virginia, at an altitude of about 1,000 ft., in the early hours of the morning. Up to then all had gone well, butshortly after she began to encounter bad weather, until, when over Cambridge, Ohio, she flew into one of thoseterrible " freak " storms so common in the Ohio belt—from which it is doubtful if even a stronger airship than the" Shenandoah " would emerge undamaged. The airship was then at an altitude of about 3,000 ft., andfor some time endeavoured to escape the storm. Suddenly, however, she was caught by tremendous up currents and roserapidly to some 5,000 ft. or more. The efforts of the crew to release the rapidly-expanding Helium gas apparentlyfailed, and the strain was too much for the hull of the airship, which broke in two.The rear, and greater, portion of the hull, some 450 ft. long, with about 20 of the crew aboard, drifted only a shortdistance before it came to earth with but little loss of life, thanks to the coolness and wonderful efforts on the partof its human cargo. The nose of the ship, however (about 140 ft. in length), plunged downwards, and in doing so thefore control car was wrenched from its attachments and .crashed to earth, its 14 occupants, including Commander Lieut.-Comdr. Rosendahl (second in command), Lieuts. J. B.Anderson and W. Mayer, and chief machinist's mates Halli- burton and Shevotiv.Thus, it will be seen that had the control car remained in .place it is probable that the loss of life would not, in allprobability, have been so much. As previously stated, several criticisms and allegations havebeen forthcoming in connection with this disaster, but until full details come to hand it is only right to withhold judgment.According to the Daily Telegraph correspondent, however, Capt. Anton Heinen, the former German dirigible pilot and con-struction adviser in the building of the " Shenandoah," stated that the removal of eight of the 18 safety valves on the diri-gible's gas bags was the cause of the disaster and that the victims of the crash " gave their lives to save this precioushelium." In the storm the craft rose too fast for the remaining valves to let off sufficient gas, he said, the upward movementof the ship causing the rapid expansion of the gas bags, which broke the shell of the ship in the middle. With only 10 safetyvalves, added Heinen, " I wouldn't have sailed on the ' Shenandoah' for a million dollars." Sir Samuel Hoare, British Secretary of State for Air, andAir-Chief Marshal Sir H. M. Trenchard have sent messages of condolence to the U.S. Government over the loss of the" Shenandoah." 580
Sign up to
Flight Digital Magazine
Flight Print Magazine
Airline Business Magazine
E-newsletters
RSS
Events
