Max Eskin wrote: Of the four rigid (Zeppelin-type) airships in the history of the US Navy, two failed due to weather and one to human factors: The Shenandoah was torn into three parts by a storm. 14 of the crew died with the central section's extra weight of gondola and engines, 29 survived in the fore and aft sections, free-ballooning to safety. The Akron was flown under the orders of Admiral Moffett into a storm off Barnagat New Jersey, 3 survivors, 73 fatalities including the Admiral who then had a base named after him. The Macon was flown with temporary repairs to a structural fault on manouvers with the fleet off Point Sur California, 2 crewman jumped to their deaths in panic, 81 survivors floated with the ship and were rescued. The Los Angeles flew for eighteen years without an accident, was scrapped for its aluminum shortly after the US entered WWII. Most people see the old footage of the Hindenberg and assume that everybody died. Of the 97 people on board, 62 survived, most uninjured. 35 on board died plus one ground crewman hit by falling structure. The US Navy used nonrigid (blimp-type) airships from the 1920s until about 1960, very heavily in WWII for coastal patrol to spot ships and especially submarines. Though forbidden to engage enemy craft due to their supposed fragility, one blimp with its radio out did engage a German submarine in the Carribean rather than let it get away while they physically reported to base. The bomb releases didn't work (they'd never been used), so they strafed the sub with their one(1) 50-cal, and took envelope damage from return fire. The submarine fled while the blimp made it almost back to base before needing rescue. In the 1960s the crew was given commendations (after decades under the cloud of court-martial for disobeying the order not to engage the enemy) when Admiral Rosendahl (a survivor many years before of the Shenandoah) found in German records an account that the sub had been damaged by the blimp to the point where it could not submerge, made it back across the Atlantic but was sunk by the Royal Navy in the North Sea. -- Ward Griffiths <mailto:gram@cnct.com> <http://www.cnct.com/home/gram/> WARNING: The Attorney General has determined that Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms can be hazardous to your health -- and get away with it.