I became rather obsessed with the R101, buying as many books and photos as I could. My parents saw it ...and the Graf Zeppelin too. There were presentiments of the crash (near Beauvais) and desperate attemps by those who did not survive to communicate their accounts and misgivings.
A third problem with the Shenandoah was that its design was based on a German Zeppelin shot down over England in WW I. These Zeppelins were designed to bomb England from high altitudes (for an airship, over 10,000 feet) and thus their structures were made as light as possible which was not strong enough to withstand the turbulent skies over the American Midwest.
Yes, that Zeppelin was one of the "height climber" type. It required special handling at lower altitudes. A very unfortunate example for the Americans to replicate.
@@KC-shunting R38 (ZR-2) was of the same design; it was lost over Kingston-upon-Hull, England in 1921 due to inadequate testing time and gross mishandling
This brings back some memories for me. As a little girl in the 3rd grade I did a presentation on airship disasters. I had gone through many a library book that covered these. It always fascinated me how so much effort went into such a disaster prone aircraft.
One of my great-great-grandfathers died in the wreck of the US Army semi-rigid airship Roma. He was from Dayton, and so he grew up around the very early aviation experiments, and he even served in WWI with the US Army aviators. A very interesting life, unfortunately cut short in 1922. I have scans of his orders to the Roma from a bunch of old documents I found at a great Aunt’s house.
The main North South artery through the city of Tampa, Florida is named after the Captain of the Roma although nobody today knows who he was or why the town's main roadway is called Dale Mabry.
The N4 Italia disaster would make an episode on its own. It was returning from a mission to the North Pole when it crashed on to the Arctic ice. The rescue of its crew became the World’s biggest news story as it featured some of the most famous explorers in the World. One of them, Roald Amundsen - a national hero in Norway and the first man to the South Pole - disappeared during a rescue mission and was never seen again.
It's worth mentioning that, due to the changes implemented after the loss of the USS Akron, when her sister ship, USS Macon, crashed off the coast of California two years later, only two of her crew died. 70 men out of a crew of 72 survived thanks to readily available life jackets and rafts.
I was hoping someone would mention the Macon. If I remember right, National Geographic had an article, with pics of the wreck, years ago. I miss the material they used to cover.
Also, survived because of warmer water - as I recall, most of the Akron’s were alive immediately after the crash and made it into the water, but almost all died of hypothermia before they could be rescued. Only three survived. One of those survivors of Akron’s crash was Herbert V. Wiley, who was on the Macon when that airship crashed (yes, your memory is correct). Lieutenant Commander on Akron, Commander (rank) and commander (in charge of the airship) on Macon. Eventually retired from the US Navy in 1947 with the rank of Rear Admiral. Another career highlight: was commanding officer of the USS West Virginia (battleship) during the last 2 years of World War 2.
Fascinating as usual. Mike Brady never fails to dazzle and illuminate his audience. With appropriate video clips underscoring his narrative, we get the whole picture of the events he's describing so vividly. It's quite a talent. Thanks, Mike, for another engrossing chapter in your omnibus of travel.
I have seen Squarespace sponsor messages on countless channels and videos, but can honestly say this is the best I've ever seen. Love the airship vid btw!
The story of the Italia is one of my favorite survival stories. 1928 going over the north pole it crashed on the ice. Men in the control car were stranded on the ice. The men in the envelope floated into the clouds and were never seen again! It was a three month ordeal to save the men on the ground. One plane tried to pickup survivors and crash landed and the pilot was stuck with them for weeks as well!
@@lawrencelewis2592 yeah, but the book "Ice Crash" went into a lot more detail. The 2 hour movie of events like this, kind of like the story of the Essex that was stove by a whale, both were made into 2 hour movies that felt rushed and large side stories left out. It would be better to make a 10 hour miniseries out of these events.
@tomm1109 The Essex movie was high key disappointing. I read the wiki article and things got very VERY insane during the whole thing. The fates of the different groups that decided to go separate ways or stay on islands is so interesting. Iircc one of the groups took indigenous women from one island and settled in an uninhabited
A great story well-told as usual Mike! There's one sordid detail I can add to the looting of the Shenendoah's wreck. Someone stole the Annapolis class ring from the corpse of the ships commander, Commander Zachary Lansdowne. Ghoulish, to say the least. It was eventually returned to the Lansdowne family years later. "Shenendoah" by the way is an American Indian word meaning "Daughter of the stars." Interestingly, aside from those early disasters the US Navy's blimp program was VERY successful and lasted into the early 1960s when technology finally overtook it. It's been said during WW2 no convoy escorted by US Navy blimps lost a ship to a U-Boot.
The Akron and Macon were such cool ships. I remember a carrier airship based off them in Crimson Skies, thought it was such a cool steam-punk design. Then I found out they actually existed. Very cool.
This was very interesting! Airships had a lot more use than I previously thought. What a sight it must have been to see one of these behemoths towering over New York.... These make the "blimps" around today look like absolute toys.
Airships are my absolute favorite mode of transportation. A personal research project of mine several years ago was to track the fate of every airship ever built--how many crashed, how many were scrapped, and how many just fell into disrepair and weren't worth spending more time and money to maintain? Very cool to stumble upon this video; I had forgotten about most of these since then!
You could easily do a 2nd part or even 3 part as it seems every big airship except the first (the Graf Zeppelin which was retired, don't count the R-100 as it was only in service 1 year) seemed to have issues. Macon, R-101, Italia, R-38, Roma, Dixmude (50 dead in that)
@@ThePaleEmperor Quite true. For the most part they were a pretty successful type of aircraft. In the end though the rapidly evolving technology of conventional aircraft overtook them.
Not sure about others, but there is at least one more. The Graz Zeppelin II, the Sister Ship to the Hindenburg. It was retired and scrapped with the Graf Zeppelin I
The R38 crashed over the River Humber in 1921, in sight of Hull Yorkshire, with the loss of 44 lives. Hull itself has a rich maritime history. HMS Bounty was built there, Joseph Boxhall was from the city, Grace Darling's Forfarshire sailed from there as 'did' Robinson Crusoe. There's also a ship on Lake Titicaca that was built in Hull then shipped to Peru in pieces, transported by rail, and then assembled.
Nice one Mike and on quite a different subject too! I'd heard of the USS Acron but not the others. The airship that finished up pointing vertically up from it's mooring mast did produce a somewhat comical picture.. I also liked your comment at the end about staying on terra firma, or, as my late Dad used to put it, "The more firmer the less terror".
The US Navy’s rigid airship program as a whole feels like a bundle, USS Los Angeles too was used as a test bed for the aircraft retrieval system to eventually be designed into Akron. There’s also Akron’s sister ship USS Macon who actually ended up flying too high at some point during her crash, though with far fewer loss of life. The sad thing about being into airships is that there simply isn’t a wide breath of information to get into but it’s very nice of you to bring some obscure knowledge to the forefront here.
Brilliant video! Airships are absolutely fascinating but not often covered outside the biggest events ("Oh the humanity!"), so it was great to hear less talked about stories. The first one doing a nose-stand on the tower is quite the sight, I can't believe it wasn't damaged. And while it didn't last long, Akron's plane deployment system was really quite incredible... I've seen footage of pilots clambering out to those biplanes, releasing themselves, flying away & then somehow managing to reattach themselves without turning both aircraft into a giant fireball. Absolute madmen!
Its interesting how airships have been mostly shuffled off to being flying billboards. But on a fun note a lighter than air craft did in a way play a part in modern history, When the Loma Prieta earthquake happened the first vehicle that could provide aerial photography of the incident was the Goodyear Blimp, It was on station for the World Series so the sports guys sent it off as far from the stadium as they could hold the microwave link back to the truck. Fun note modern Goodyear blimps are now semi rigid airships built in cooperation with the Zeppelin company and not actually blimp. They still call them blimps because well the branding is that.
@@filanfyretracker Absolutely, lighter-than-air craft still have important roles even today... apparently the DEA have a whole network of aerostat radar balloons along the US southern border to detect low-flying drug trafficking planes. Quite an efficient way to elevate equipment like radar and hold in position for extended periods.
There was hangar space for the planes (Curtiss F9Cs) inside the envelope. Once the pilot boarded the plane, the trapeze swung outside the airship, the plane's engine was started and it took off. Eventually the landing gear was removed from the F9Cs as they were only deployed over water, and off and onto the trapezes. An auxiliary belly tank was mounted instead, for extra scouting range.
I've only heard of the USS Akron disaster. However, I think the most dramatic airship disaster was the July 21, 1919 Wingfoot crash into the Illinois Trust & Savings Bank. It crashed through the giant skylight over the banking floor dropping it's engine on an employee who returned from sick leave a day early to show what a good worker he was - spilled burning fuel all over the head teller; and someone who parachuted off of the airship landed on the Board of Trade building before being pulled to his death because his parachute got stuck on the falling wreck. There were other deaths in the bank as well as the crew.
As a lifelong Ohioan, I've driven past the crash site of the Shenandoah plenty of times. There is now a sign that can be seen from the freeway marking the crash site. I also live an hour or so from the city of Akron (probably the namesake of the USS Akron) and have had the opportunity to drive past the hanger where the Goodyear blimp was house for many years. Up until recently (like the last five years), we used to see the Goodyear blimp all the time dragging advertisements behind it or the side lit up with some cool animation. It was neat to see. Thanks for the sharing this video!
The huge black hangar at the Akron-Fulton airport is the Goodyear Airdock and was where the Akron and the Macon were constructed. You can see that hangar (along with the newer one for the Goodyear Blimp) for miles from the air.
Happy 5th birthday to a spectacularly large toddler!!! Your shows are so interesting, I never miss a single word or detail because of how engaging everything is!!! Happy 5th birthday and I hope Australian Kindergarten treats you well Mr. Brady!!!! Edit: this is obviously done in good spirit, no I don’t actually think the man is five years old.
This video was great! I definitely don’t mind a different kind of video like this. Please make more videos about these old airships, still waiting for that R101 video.
The Shenandoah was just like when the “Eldia” was beached on Nauset Beach, Cape Cod back in 1984. They created mini-economies and became tourist attractions.
My Dad drove me out to the Cape to see the Eldia when I was a little kid. I still have the souvenir picture book "The grounding of the Eldia on Nauset beach" by William P. Quinn
Well done Captain Mike, another fantastic video and I liked the slight change in having airship disasters instead. Congratulations on O. D. being 5 years old, here's to another 5! 😊👍🚀
it's so awesome to finally see airships on the channel, i've been looking forward to you covering the akron for a long time. great storytelling as always, mike
@oceanliner Designs, If you're branching out why not look at the story of the California clipper (a Pan Am boeing 314 sea plane) which had to fly west the long way back from new zealand to new york in WW2, after getting cut off there in December 1941
As a Canadian, I very much appreciated that you pronounced Newfoundland correctly. It's refreshing to see a RUclipsr that does their research on pronunciation instead of just saying " I'm going to get this wrong ha, ha." Job well done!
If you haven't heard it, I recommend the Iron Maiden song, Empire of the Clouds. It's an eighteen minute epic that tells the story of British airship R-101. It's a fantastic song.
Thanks, I am from Bulgaria and I follow your channel mainly for Titanic related topics. It's interesting to hear about airships here. I was recently in the Yambol museum of Battle Glory and among tanks and guns there is a room dedicated to that record zeppelin flight - a nice diorama of LZ-104 over its hangar in Yambol (Bulgaria). Hope that's interesting info for some of the viewers.
@@KPW2137 I would instantly recommend you the class Romeo - Slava submarine museum near the city of Varna. I have a video from my visit there last year and you can check it out if you consider that interesting. Also the aircraft museums in Krumovo (near Plovdiv) and Burgas are great, so I recommend them too (got videos uploaded from these places too).
My favorite weird airship tale is the L-8. She left San Francisco on antisubmarine patrol then returned...without her crew. In the mid-2000s I saw a zeppelin with my own eyes. It was surreal as it slowly cruised in over the Golden Gate then passed nearby. The company didn't last long, tourist flights turned out to be economically unworkable, but it certainly was a sight to see.
I've heard about the L-8- didn't it land itself in downtown Sunnyvale? I've heard that there were half-eaten sandwiches on a table and coffee that was still hot.
The NASA Aames Research Center has a blimp hangar in Sunnyvale, Calif. The hangar is 1100 feet long, 300 feet wide, and 190 feet tall. I think the L-8 operated out of there. Goodyear operated a blimp and it was seen a lot over the Bay Area. There was a white blimp that gave rides over the Bay Area as well. I think it was sponsored by a camera company, Fuji possibly. I remember big green letters on the side of it.
@@kimmer6 Parts of the fairly recent Star Trek movie with Chris Pine was filmed there. I understand that that buiding is so large that it has its own weather in it. Fascinating as Spock would say.
And what Zeppelin would that be? The last Zeppelin built was the LZ 130 Graf Zeppelin II launched in 1938 and scrapped in 1940. No rigid airships have been constructed since.
Another great watch, thanks.... How about a vid "RMS Aquitania Through The Decades" The Aquitania had a very long career (1914 - 1950) for a four funnel ocean liner. During her refits she never went to three or even two funnels, she went to the breakers yard with all four still intact.
An interesting video, thanks, Mike, for the excellent pictures and details of these events. My grandfather, Capt Donald E Harkness, witnessed the bombs falling from Zeppelin L-13 on London on Sept. 8, 1915, as it flew directly over the house where he was staying. This was one of the first and most successful of all the Zeppelin raids of the war and it left him with a burning desire to shoot the things from the sky. He soon thereafter enrolled in the Ruffy-Baumann School of Flying, obtained his flying "ticket" and having shown promise secured an officer's commission in the UK's Royal Naval Air Service. While getting flight experience on various types of aircraft at Eastchurch and Dover he was selected to become one of the first pilots to be stationed at No. 5 Wing, Coudekerque, France, and had a highly successful career bombing ammo dumps, German aerodromes and assorted military depots in France and Belgium. He never got the chance to shoot down a Zeppelin, but he did earn the DSC for destroying a Zeppelin shed at Evere, Brussels on Aug. 9, 1916. He died in 1929 in Auckland, New Zealand (his native country) while test flying a Dornier Libelle II flying boat with which he had hoped to start an airline in the country. He lived a short 35 years but had a fascinating life, I wish I knew him personally. 100 years after the war I wrote a book on his adventures based on his diaries called A WW1 Adventure, The Life and Times of RNAS Bomber Pilot Donald E. Harkness. BTW. It took 47 days for him to travel by ocean-liner from Wellington, NZ to London, in 1915. The voyage alone was enough to drive some passengers batty.
For those of us that live around Akron, lots of people have stories. i, myself have a piece of Blimp skin that my Uncle Chick had from working in the Blimp Dock during WWII. When my wife and i got married, our landlord worked at Goodyear Aerospace and told me about finding Goodyear Zeppelin Corp. boxes when cleaning out the Blimp Dock. This was the home of the F2G Super Corsair, of which 10 were built - an FG-1D with some airframe modifications and a P&W R-4360 bolted on the front.
Another interesting airship story: during WWI, the Zeppelin L31 attempted to carry out a bombing raid on British soil, but near the Thames Estuary, she was attacked by HMTB (His Majesty’s Torpedo Boat) 117, which opened fire on the Zeppelin with help from a lighthouse. Tracer rounds from 117’s guns struck L31’s tail, causing her crew to abort their attack. For this, HMTB 117’s captain was awarded the Distinguished Service Order. The captain’s name? Charles Herbert Lightoller. No, I’m serious.
great video!! as an Ohio native who used to live in Akron and who regularly drove past the Goodyear Airdock where the USS Akron was constructed i was happy to see that ship mentioned here. (Also i can't help but giggle at people who aren't from the area trying to pronounce 'Akron' haha)
@@ellielobes Ha! that is how I always felt. Left right after college for the west, Colorado, Cali, then Idaho, now back in rural central Ohio. These days I only go to Akron for Strickland's Frozen Custard, which of course has a great view of the airdock 🙂
This was brilliant. Definitely do more!! And a shift from your oceanliners and warships.... that's what we know you for.... to many people discuss aircraft, many pilots and I love there stuff, but ya don't see them talking about airships, and it's an interesting subject there engineering was a marvel for the time, they were not just big balloons!!... brilliantly narrates to, can tell you did this video because you are interested not because somebody asked! People may have, but don't believe that's why you made this video. It's a cracking subject!!!! Muts nuts mate!!!
Mike, you might want to do a show on the USS Patoka which was the converted tanker, with the mooring mast added to her stern, the US Navy used as a floating base for their airships and is seen in many videos.
I am sorry you don't wish to ride in a hot air balloon. I did so as a birthday celebration a couple of years ago. Wonderful experience floating over the Front Range of the Colorado Rockies.
Besides growing up in NJ and being familiar with Lakehurst, I completed flight training in college at Akron-Fulton Airport in Ohio and got to see the hangar (the Goodyear Airdock) where the Akron and the Macon were constructed. It is an amazing structure and something you can see for miles from the air when flying around the Akron / Kent area. Unfortunately didn't get to go inside, even when I interned with the FAA, as Lockheed owned the building at the time and were working on some top secret blimps for the military and you needed a security clearance to enter.
I can't believe my father WANTED to fly on these death traps for the US Navy. He was a mechanic and flew a few missions to Cuba from Lakehurst in the late 1940's. Loved the presentation!
Now that's something that people don't see in the sky anymore is Blimps. They were good for advertising. They should bring them back for the Superbowl 🏈 or something.
Shame the r-101 wasn’t mentioned. I grew up in Beauvais (France), the town near which it crashed. It’s still well remembered today - there’s even a museum, if memory serves.
I'm pretty sure he's looking to do something with R-101, and she's probably the second most popular airship. So he didn't want to include her in a "5 lesser known" list :)
@@Roddy556I didn't know about any of this. Just because you obviously have a passion about something does not mean everyone else does. He doesn't make video's for you either. He makes them for us. So no, its not clickbait
The only other airship disaster I had heard of before this video was the British R-101 mainly thanks to a Doctor Who audio adventure covering the disaster but adding a twist to it.
You have to try a hot air balloon ride!! It's so peaceful. Book an exclusive ride, therefore you're not going to be packed in like cattle. It'll just be you and your guests. Awesome experience!!!
I appreciate that you're incorporating dirigibles into your content. Thanks. Airships and early ocean liners, a long with skyscrapers were my obsession 20 years ago in highschool. Still love em. If they only had RUclips then. Ha. Keep it up man. 👍
i love airships! i remember in sixth grade in like 2013 we had these books about famous disasters, and each week we read about one and answered dumb questions about the article, dumb middle school stuff... i remember the hindenburg vividly, i just thought it looked so cool, and the fact that to this day it is still one of the largest objects to fly is incredible!
This video was amazing! I'm so glad you did one on some airships, would it be possible if you did a full-length video on the Graf Zeppelin? It's arguably the most successful Zeppelin of all time
Good old utube, I’m subscribed to your channel but ut doesn’t bring up many new videos. Anyway, thank you for this well sourced lesson on a few of my favorite airships. There are many more with very colorful histories and back stories. The British R101, USA Macon, Graf Zeppelin etc etc. thanks again from Alaska
I remember seeing footage of a 1930's Navy Blimp that was caught up in the wind as it tried to land. The ground crews tried to hold it down and some of the men didn't let go of the ropes but were pulled high into the air only to fall to their tragic deaths. Can't erase seeing that RIP to the brave sailors.
It's difficult today for people to understand the confidence in the future of rigid airships that prevailed in the 1920s and 30s. With aircraft able to carry just a very few people in hugely uncomfortable conditions over very short distances, the idea of an airship able to carry a few dozen people in luxury for thousands of miles was, in many minds, the future. An Atlantic liner of the skies, but not restricted to ocean travel. Aeronautical design progress has been phenomenally fast. From the Wright brother's first flight of a few hundred feet, to Neil Armstrong stepping on the moon was just 65 years, less than a typical lifetime, from the first flight of the Spitfire to the early design plans for Concord was just seven years.
I live near the hangar that housed the Macon. The hangar is currently being restored. I remember touring it back in the early 2000s and it's such a massive structure.
It's too bad that the era of the airship was short lived. Passenger airships specifically looked like a great experience. I'd prefer them over cramped planes where you can barely walk anywhere except to the bathroom or maybe a bar if the plane even offers that, which most planes don't. Sure, planes are faster but I'd rather a more leisurely way of travel and enjoy the experience of moving about and socializing with other passengers. This is also the reason why I prefer ocean liner travel as well. I can just imagine what passenger airships would be like today if they were actually successful.
I actually have a section girder brace of the Shenandoah that was from the infamous looting-- I bought from someone local to me who had it in their family! Additionally, my great great uncle was part of the dirigible/airship program in the Navy and I have some of his original photos of the Shenandoah. He also flew across the Atlantic on the Hindenburg, and I have a few of the official Hindenburg postcards he sent to my family.
Glad someone covered other airship disasters besides the Hindenburg! Well
Done Mike!
But what about the R101?
Mike was right. I have heard of other airship disasters before, but not these ones.
@@eddiewillers1 Yes good point as the R 101 WAS a disaster!
I wonder if the story about the airship Norge and Italia is unheard of
I became rather obsessed with the R101, buying as many books and photos as I could. My parents saw it ...and the Graf Zeppelin too. There were presentiments of the crash (near Beauvais) and desperate attemps by those who did not survive to communicate their accounts and misgivings.
A third problem with the Shenandoah was that its design was based on a German Zeppelin shot down over England in WW I. These Zeppelins were designed to bomb England from high altitudes (for an airship, over 10,000 feet) and thus their structures were made as light as possible which was not strong enough to withstand the turbulent skies over the American Midwest.
Yes, that Zeppelin was one of the "height climber" type. It required special handling at lower altitudes. A very unfortunate example for the Americans to replicate.
America can't really do anything right.
@@KC-shunting
Yep, very true. Trial and error can often be costly
Did they ever bomb anything from a zeppelin? Is that even true? Sounds like war propaganda.
@@KC-shunting R38 (ZR-2) was of the same design; it was lost over Kingston-upon-Hull, England in 1921 due to inadequate testing time and gross mishandling
This brings back some memories for me. As a little girl in the 3rd grade I did a presentation on airship disasters. I had gone through many a library book that covered these. It always fascinated me how so much effort went into such a disaster prone aircraft.
One of my great-great-grandfathers died in the wreck of the US Army semi-rigid airship Roma. He was from Dayton, and so he grew up around the very early aviation experiments, and he even served in WWI with the US Army aviators. A very interesting life, unfortunately cut short in 1922. I have scans of his orders to the Roma from a bunch of old documents I found at a great Aunt’s house.
@Hlostoops they’re not the greatest quality, but I’d certainly be willing to send them over his way.
This is the type of comment thread that makes RUclips a good platform still.
I hope to read some good news about it.
The main North South artery through the city of Tampa, Florida is named after the Captain of the Roma although nobody today knows who he was or why the town's main roadway is called Dale Mabry.
😍💕☺️😍
The N4 Italia disaster would make an episode on its own. It was returning from a mission to the North Pole when it crashed on to the Arctic ice. The rescue of its crew became the World’s biggest news story as it featured some of the most famous explorers in the World. One of them, Roald Amundsen - a national hero in Norway and the first man to the South Pole - disappeared during a rescue mission and was never seen again.
And the Norge Alaskan adventure.
The Italia was not returning, they crashed north of Norway on the way out.
That sounds really interesting.
Roald was pretty old to be in the arctic by that time and had had a hard life. He wasn't in top shape by anymeans.
Amazing man though.
And a man who was sent out to look for survivors died when his little plane crashed and overturned.
It's worth mentioning that, due to the changes implemented after the loss of the USS Akron, when her sister ship, USS Macon, crashed off the coast of California two years later, only two of her crew died. 70 men out of a crew of 72 survived thanks to readily available life jackets and rafts.
Corect me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall that one of the Macon's survivors had also been a crewman on the Akron when she went down.
I was hoping someone would mention the Macon. If I remember right, National Geographic had an article, with pics of the wreck, years ago.
I miss the material they used to cover.
Captain Smith of the Titanic has been awfully quiet after hearing this...
Correct - he was one of the officers.
Also, survived because of warmer water - as I recall, most of the Akron’s were alive immediately after the crash and made it into the water, but almost all died of hypothermia before they could be rescued. Only three survived.
One of those survivors of Akron’s crash was Herbert V. Wiley, who was on the Macon when that airship crashed (yes, your memory is correct). Lieutenant Commander on Akron, Commander (rank) and commander (in charge of the airship) on Macon. Eventually retired from the US Navy in 1947 with the rank of Rear Admiral. Another career highlight: was commanding officer of the USS West Virginia (battleship) during the last 2 years of World War 2.
Fascinating as usual. Mike Brady never fails to dazzle and illuminate his audience. With appropriate video clips underscoring his narrative, we get the whole picture of the events he's describing so vividly. It's quite a talent. Thanks, Mike, for another engrossing chapter in your omnibus of travel.
I have seen Squarespace sponsor messages on countless channels and videos, but can honestly say this is the best I've ever seen. Love the airship vid btw!
The story of the Italia is one of my favorite survival stories. 1928 going over the north pole it crashed on the ice. Men in the control car were stranded on the ice. The men in the envelope floated into the clouds and were never seen again! It was a three month ordeal to save the men on the ground. One plane tried to pickup survivors and crash landed and the pilot was stuck with them for weeks as well!
There is a movie about that called "The Red Tent" with Sean Connery playing Roald Amundsen. From about 1973 as I recall.
@@lawrencelewis2592 yeah, but the book "Ice Crash" went into a lot more detail. The 2 hour movie of events like this, kind of like the story of the Essex that was stove by a whale, both were made into 2 hour movies that felt rushed and large side stories left out. It would be better to make a 10 hour miniseries out of these events.
@@tomm1109 I agree with you- now I have to find that book.
@tomm1109 The Essex movie was high key disappointing. I read the wiki article and things got very VERY insane during the whole thing. The fates of the different groups that decided to go separate ways or stay on islands is so interesting. Iircc one of the groups took indigenous women from one island and settled in an uninhabited
How terrifying to float away into the sky never again to be seen. Just awful.
They got the word "ship" in them so it looks like you found a loophole in your content 😄 I like it 👍🏼
A great story well-told as usual Mike!
There's one sordid detail I can add to the looting of the Shenendoah's wreck. Someone stole the Annapolis class ring from the corpse of the ships commander, Commander Zachary Lansdowne. Ghoulish, to say the least. It was eventually returned to the Lansdowne family years later.
"Shenendoah" by the way is an American Indian word meaning "Daughter of the stars."
Interestingly, aside from those early disasters the US Navy's blimp program was VERY successful and lasted into the early 1960s when technology finally overtook it. It's been said during WW2 no convoy escorted by US Navy blimps lost a ship to a U-Boot.
The Akron and Macon were such cool ships. I remember a carrier airship based off them in Crimson Skies, thought it was such a cool steam-punk design. Then I found out they actually existed. Very cool.
No better way to start a Monday than having Mike tell me about some terrible tragedies. Another fantastic Video!
The Shenandoah was not the first airship to cross the Atlantic. That feat belongs to Britain's R34 airship which accomplished this in 1919.
Thank you for bringing these really interesting stories to the forefront. Onwards and upwards :)
This was very interesting! Airships had a lot more use than I previously thought.
What a sight it must have been to see one of these behemoths towering over New York....
These make the "blimps" around today look like absolute toys.
Airships are my absolute favorite mode of transportation. A personal research project of mine several years ago was to track the fate of every airship ever built--how many crashed, how many were scrapped, and how many just fell into disrepair and weren't worth spending more time and money to maintain? Very cool to stumble upon this video; I had forgotten about most of these since then!
This is great. Your channel just gets better and better as it grows.
Thank you!
You could easily do a 2nd part or even 3 part as it seems every big airship except the first (the Graf Zeppelin which was retired, don't count the R-100 as it was only in service 1 year) seemed to have issues. Macon, R-101, Italia, R-38, Roma, Dixmude (50 dead in that)
Not all rigids had issues, as there were 161 built between 1899-1938.
@@ThePaleEmperor Quite true. For the most part they were a pretty successful type of aircraft. In the end though the rapidly evolving technology of conventional aircraft overtook them.
Not sure about others, but there is at least one more. The Graz Zeppelin II, the Sister Ship to the Hindenburg. It was retired and scrapped with the Graf Zeppelin I
@@100dampf True, but GZ II didn't have a very long service life and didn't aquire anywhere the fame of it's namesake.
R100 was put scraped because of the r101 crash
The R38 crashed over the River Humber in 1921, in sight of Hull Yorkshire, with the loss of 44 lives. Hull itself has a rich maritime history. HMS Bounty was built there, Joseph Boxhall was from the city, Grace Darling's Forfarshire sailed from there as 'did' Robinson Crusoe. There's also a ship on Lake Titicaca that was built in Hull then shipped to Peru in pieces, transported by rail, and then assembled.
Don’t forget Amy Johnson, a Yorkshire lass from Hull.
Thanks for the detailed comment. I watched the video expecting it to be covered but seems it didn't make the cut.
I spoke to an old lady in Sledmere, East Yorkshire in 1998. Her dad took her to Hull that day. She told me that she witnessed the incident.
The R followed by an alphanumeric designation has continued up to this day with the USNAVY's stealth airship program.
04:46
Oh, for God's Sake... I hope the ones who decided it was a good idea got tormented.
Yep. Stay away from gasbags! Great episode Mike. Most interesting 👍
Lovely video. Your work is amazing. Thank you so much for all you do.
Nice one Mike and on quite a different subject too! I'd heard of the USS Acron but not the others. The airship that finished up pointing vertically up from it's mooring mast did produce a somewhat comical picture.. I also liked your comment at the end about staying on terra firma, or, as my late Dad used to put it, "The more firmer the less terror".
The US Navy’s rigid airship program as a whole feels like a bundle, USS Los Angeles too was used as a test bed for the aircraft retrieval system to eventually be designed into Akron. There’s also Akron’s sister ship USS Macon who actually ended up flying too high at some point during her crash, though with far fewer loss of life. The sad thing about being into airships is that there simply isn’t a wide breath of information to get into but it’s very nice of you to bring some obscure knowledge to the forefront here.
Brilliant video! Airships are absolutely fascinating but not often covered outside the biggest events ("Oh the humanity!"), so it was great to hear less talked about stories. The first one doing a nose-stand on the tower is quite the sight, I can't believe it wasn't damaged. And while it didn't last long, Akron's plane deployment system was really quite incredible... I've seen footage of pilots clambering out to those biplanes, releasing themselves, flying away & then somehow managing to reattach themselves without turning both aircraft into a giant fireball. Absolute madmen!
Its interesting how airships have been mostly shuffled off to being flying billboards. But on a fun note a lighter than air craft did in a way play a part in modern history, When the Loma Prieta earthquake happened the first vehicle that could provide aerial photography of the incident was the Goodyear Blimp, It was on station for the World Series so the sports guys sent it off as far from the stadium as they could hold the microwave link back to the truck. Fun note modern Goodyear blimps are now semi rigid airships built in cooperation with the Zeppelin company and not actually blimp. They still call them blimps because well the branding is that.
@@filanfyretracker Absolutely, lighter-than-air craft still have important roles even today... apparently the DEA have a whole network of aerostat radar balloons along the US southern border to detect low-flying drug trafficking planes. Quite an efficient way to elevate equipment like radar and hold in position for extended periods.
There was hangar space for the planes (Curtiss F9Cs) inside the envelope. Once the pilot boarded the plane, the trapeze swung outside the airship, the plane's engine was started and it took off.
Eventually the landing gear was removed from the F9Cs as they were only deployed over water, and off and onto the trapezes. An auxiliary belly tank was mounted instead, for extra scouting range.
I've only heard of the USS Akron disaster. However, I think the most dramatic airship disaster was the July 21, 1919 Wingfoot crash into the Illinois Trust & Savings Bank. It crashed through the giant skylight over the banking floor dropping it's engine on an employee who returned from sick leave a day early to show what a good worker he was - spilled burning fuel all over the head teller; and someone who parachuted off of the airship landed on the Board of Trade building before being pulled to his death because his parachute got stuck on the falling wreck. There were other deaths in the bank as well as the crew.
WOW, I'll have to look that up!
@@tomm1109 "City of Scoundrels: The 12 Days of Disaster That Gave Birth to Modern Chicago" by Gary Krist.
As a lifelong Ohioan, I've driven past the crash site of the Shenandoah plenty of times. There is now a sign that can be seen from the freeway marking the crash site. I also live an hour or so from the city of Akron (probably the namesake of the USS Akron) and have had the opportunity to drive past the hanger where the Goodyear blimp was house for many years. Up until recently (like the last five years), we used to see the Goodyear blimp all the time dragging advertisements behind it or the side lit up with some cool animation. It was neat to see. Thanks for the sharing this video!
The huge black hangar at the Akron-Fulton airport is the Goodyear Airdock and was where the Akron and the Macon were constructed. You can see that hangar (along with the newer one for the Goodyear Blimp) for miles from the air.
Love how the local high school is called The Zeps, too. Go Bucks!
At one time the McDonalds near the Akron-Fulton airport had a wall with a drawing of the USS Akron on it's wall.
Happy 5th birthday to a spectacularly large toddler!!! Your shows are so interesting, I never miss a single word or detail because of how engaging everything is!!! Happy 5th birthday and I hope Australian Kindergarten treats you well Mr. Brady!!!!
Edit: this is obviously done in good spirit, no I don’t actually think the man is five years old.
This video was great! I definitely don’t mind a different kind of video like this. Please make more videos about these old airships, still waiting for that R101 video.
"safety valves were removed" - straight to the famous last worlds list :)
The Shenandoah was just like when the “Eldia” was beached on Nauset Beach, Cape Cod back in 1984. They created mini-economies and became tourist attractions.
My Dad drove me out to the Cape to see the Eldia when I was a little kid. I still have the souvenir picture book "The grounding of the Eldia on Nauset beach" by William P. Quinn
Shenandoah was the real reason why Billy Mitchell spoke up about the Army's negligence
Well done Captain Mike, another fantastic video and I liked the slight change in having airship disasters instead. Congratulations on O. D. being 5 years old, here's to another 5! 😊👍🚀
If there's one thing I've learned by watching tragedy videos on RUclips, it's that people riding balloons don't work.
I’m glad that you are talking about Airships!
This was excellent! I'd love to see more about airship design.
I can’t believe this type of content is free. Also love the fact your doing videos outside of ocean liners!
it's so awesome to finally see airships on the channel, i've been looking forward to you covering the akron for a long time.
great storytelling as always, mike
This is realy interesting. Please do more disaster stuff like this
@oceanliner Designs, If you're branching out why not look at the story of the California clipper (a Pan Am boeing 314 sea plane) which had to fly west the long way back from new zealand to new york in WW2, after getting cut off there in December 1941
As a Canadian, I very much appreciated that you pronounced Newfoundland correctly. It's refreshing to see a RUclipsr that does their research on pronunciation instead of just saying " I'm going to get this wrong ha, ha." Job well done!
Mike, by far and away the best content of its type, thanks!
If you haven't heard it, I recommend the Iron Maiden song, Empire of the Clouds. It's an eighteen minute epic that tells the story of British airship R-101. It's a fantastic song.
Always enjoy your information! Thank you 😊
Thanks, I am from Bulgaria and I follow your channel mainly for Titanic related topics. It's interesting to hear about airships here. I was recently in the Yambol museum of Battle Glory and among tanks and guns there is a room dedicated to that record zeppelin flight - a nice diorama of LZ-104 over its hangar in Yambol (Bulgaria). Hope that's interesting info for some of the viewers.
I hope to visit Bulgaria during one of my planned motorcycle trips.
Just added the Yambol museum to the list of places worth visitng. Thank you!
@@KPW2137 glad to hear my comment was useful!
You're welcome! BTW If you know other, less obvious places worth visiting, do not hesitate to let me know. I would appreciate it :) @@Chained2Alice
@@KPW2137 I would instantly recommend you the class Romeo - Slava submarine museum near the city of Varna. I have a video from my visit there last year and you can check it out if you consider that interesting. Also the aircraft museums in Krumovo (near Plovdiv) and Burgas are great, so I recommend them too (got videos uploaded from these places too).
"Holy #$%& I can see New York!" made me laugh harder than I should have.
My favorite weird airship tale is the L-8. She left San Francisco on antisubmarine patrol then returned...without her crew.
In the mid-2000s I saw a zeppelin with my own eyes. It was surreal as it slowly cruised in over the Golden Gate then passed nearby. The company didn't last long, tourist flights turned out to be economically unworkable, but it certainly was a sight to see.
I've heard about the L-8- didn't it land itself in downtown Sunnyvale? I've heard that there were half-eaten sandwiches on a table and coffee that was still hot.
The NASA Aames Research Center has a blimp hangar in Sunnyvale, Calif. The hangar is 1100 feet long, 300 feet wide, and 190 feet tall. I think the L-8 operated out of there. Goodyear operated a blimp and it was seen a lot over the Bay Area. There was a white blimp that gave rides over the Bay Area as well. I think it was sponsored by a camera company, Fuji possibly. I remember big green letters on the side of it.
@@kimmer6 Parts of the fairly recent Star Trek movie with Chris Pine was filmed there. I understand that that buiding is so large that it has its own weather in it. Fascinating as Spock would say.
@@lawrencelewis2592The L-8 came down on a street in Daly City, California.
And what Zeppelin would that be? The last Zeppelin built was the LZ 130 Graf Zeppelin II launched in 1938 and scrapped in 1940. No rigid airships have been constructed since.
Always glad to see a new vid from my friend, Mike Brady!
1:26 "holy fuck I can see New York" 😂
Babe wake up new Oceanliner Designs video is out
WOW! I didn't know about all of these. Great video.
Love your “expansion”! Would love to hear your take on more of those “tragic incidents” that occurred more regularly back in the day.
Another great watch, thanks.... How about a vid "RMS Aquitania Through The Decades"
The Aquitania had a very long career (1914 - 1950) for a four funnel ocean liner. During her refits she never went to three or even two funnels, she went to the breakers yard with all four still intact.
Thank you for your videos! You are the most interesting waiter I know.
An interesting video, thanks, Mike, for the excellent pictures and details of these events. My grandfather, Capt Donald E Harkness, witnessed the bombs falling from Zeppelin L-13 on London on Sept. 8, 1915, as it flew directly over the house where he was staying. This was one of the first and most successful of all the Zeppelin raids of the war and it left him with a burning desire to shoot the things from the sky. He soon thereafter enrolled in the Ruffy-Baumann School of Flying, obtained his flying "ticket" and having shown promise secured an officer's commission in the UK's Royal Naval Air Service. While getting flight experience on various types of aircraft at Eastchurch and Dover he was selected to become one of the first pilots to be stationed at No. 5 Wing, Coudekerque, France, and had a highly successful career bombing ammo dumps, German aerodromes and assorted military depots in France and Belgium. He never got the chance to shoot down a Zeppelin, but he did earn the DSC for destroying a Zeppelin shed at Evere, Brussels on Aug. 9, 1916. He died in 1929 in Auckland, New Zealand (his native country) while test flying a Dornier Libelle II flying boat with which he had hoped to start an airline in the country. He lived a short 35 years but had a fascinating life, I wish I knew him personally. 100 years after the war I wrote a book on his adventures based on his diaries called A WW1 Adventure, The Life and Times of RNAS Bomber Pilot Donald E. Harkness.
BTW. It took 47 days for him to travel by ocean-liner from Wellington, NZ to London, in 1915. The voyage alone was enough to drive some passengers batty.
Wow, I actually hadn't heard of any of these! And I love airships!
Fantastic to see them on the channel! I'd love to see some more soon!
Love this, Mike Brady, so polished and professional, sharp good guy
For those of us that live around Akron, lots of people have stories. i, myself have a piece of Blimp skin that my Uncle Chick had from working in the Blimp Dock during WWII. When my wife and i got married, our landlord worked at Goodyear Aerospace and told me about finding Goodyear Zeppelin Corp. boxes when cleaning out the Blimp Dock. This was the home of the F2G Super Corsair, of which 10 were built - an FG-1D with some airframe modifications and a P&W R-4360 bolted on the front.
Great video Mike, thank you!
There are a couple there I've not heard of before.
Are you planning drawing any of the airships in the future?
Another interesting airship story: during WWI, the Zeppelin L31 attempted to carry out a bombing raid on British soil, but near the Thames Estuary, she was attacked by HMTB (His Majesty’s Torpedo Boat) 117, which opened fire on the Zeppelin with help from a lighthouse. Tracer rounds from 117’s guns struck L31’s tail, causing her crew to abort their attack. For this, HMTB 117’s captain was awarded the Distinguished Service Order.
The captain’s name? Charles Herbert Lightoller.
No, I’m serious.
great video!! as an Ohio native who used to live in Akron and who regularly drove past the Goodyear Airdock where the USS Akron was constructed i was happy to see that ship mentioned here. (Also i can't help but giggle at people who aren't from the area trying to pronounce 'Akron' haha)
Another NE Ohioan here, I also giggled a bit. I suppose I can't fault anyone for not knowing it's pronounced "Ack-run"
Originally from Akron, and I like his pronunciation. It puts a bit of a shine on Akron that it often doesn't get.
@@timothymills733 that it doesn't often get and perhaps doesn't deserve 😄. unless they've really spruced that city up since moved to Oregon haha
@@ellielobes Ha! that is how I always felt. Left right after college for the west, Colorado, Cali, then Idaho, now back in rural central Ohio. These days I only go to Akron for Strickland's Frozen Custard, which of course has a great view of the airdock 🙂
Same!
This was brilliant. Definitely do more!! And a shift from your oceanliners and warships.... that's what we know you for.... to many people discuss aircraft, many pilots and I love there stuff, but ya don't see them talking about airships, and it's an interesting subject there engineering was a marvel for the time, they were not just big balloons!!... brilliantly narrates to, can tell you did this video because you are interested not because somebody asked! People may have, but don't believe that's why you made this video. It's a cracking subject!!!! Muts nuts mate!!!
The R101? She has some 'maiden voyage' similarities with a well-known oceanliner.
Mike, you might want to do a show on the USS Patoka which was the converted tanker, with the mooring mast added to her stern, the US Navy used as a floating base for their airships and is seen in many videos.
I am sorry you don't wish to ride in a hot air balloon. I did so as a birthday celebration a couple of years ago. Wonderful experience floating over the Front Range of the Colorado Rockies.
Intriguing stuff. The oceanliner content is fascinating but I am totally here for branching off into other vessels ;)
Beatifully done Mike! 🍸
Besides growing up in NJ and being familiar with Lakehurst, I completed flight training in college at Akron-Fulton Airport in Ohio and got to see the hangar (the Goodyear Airdock) where the Akron and the Macon were constructed. It is an amazing structure and something you can see for miles from the air when flying around the Akron / Kent area. Unfortunately didn't get to go inside, even when I interned with the FAA, as Lockheed owned the building at the time and were working on some top secret blimps for the military and you needed a security clearance to enter.
Just one correction, the first transatlantic crossing by an airship was by the UK's R - 34 on July 2, 1919.
Thanks for your videos I enjoy your work.
I can't believe my father WANTED to fly on these death traps for the US Navy. He was a mechanic and flew a few missions to Cuba from Lakehurst in the late 1940's. Loved the presentation!
Awesome to hear Airship history, seems very under appreciated!
Nice with a different kind of video, Skyliner Designs. Airships have always been fascinating to me.
Now that's something that people don't see in the sky anymore is Blimps. They were good for advertising. They should bring them back for the Superbowl 🏈 or something.
I have actually heard of all these airship disasters. Although you did not cover this one, The R-101 has one of the most beautiful interiors.
LZ-130 Graf Zeppelin II had the best interiors, IMHO. Sadly, she's barely known as she never entered into commercial service.
Yeah I hate stupid misleading video titles like this. Takes away from what would be good content.
Shame the r-101 wasn’t mentioned. I grew up in Beauvais (France), the town near which it crashed. It’s still well remembered today - there’s even a museum, if memory serves.
I'm pretty sure he's looking to do something with R-101, and she's probably the second most popular airship. So he didn't want to include her in a "5 lesser known" list :)
@@Roddy556I didn't know about any of this. Just because you obviously have a passion about something does not mean everyone else does. He doesn't make video's for you either. He makes them for us. So no, its not clickbait
The only other airship disaster I had heard of before this video was the British R-101 mainly thanks to a Doctor Who audio adventure covering the disaster but adding a twist to it.
Great work Oceanliner Designs.
I've seen that picture of the Los Angeles vertical over the mooring mast a thousand times and I've _always_ thought it was a photoshop...
Nice presentation and photos, and LOVE that there’s zero/very quiet music
You have to try a hot air balloon ride!! It's so peaceful. Book an exclusive ride, therefore you're not going to be packed in like cattle. It'll just be you and your guests. Awesome experience!!!
I appreciate that you're incorporating dirigibles into your content. Thanks. Airships and early ocean liners, a long with skyscrapers were my obsession 20 years ago in highschool. Still love em. If they only had RUclips then. Ha. Keep it up man. 👍
i love airships! i remember in sixth grade in like 2013 we had these books about famous disasters, and each week we read about one and answered dumb questions about the article, dumb middle school stuff... i remember the hindenburg vividly, i just thought it looked so cool, and the fact that to this day it is still one of the largest objects to fly is incredible!
Nice to see you finally talk about Airships. I would like to go on one, even if they are a flying death trap. Nice video as always Mike!
They’re actually about as safe as other aircraft of the time. They weren’t deathtraps-except insofar as all aircraft were back in the day.
The were absolutely not death traps. Far more safe than the planes of the time and even more safe now after decades more technological development
@@googleuser3163
Fun fact: blimps in World War II we’re safer and more reliable than the most common helicopter on the market today (Robinson R44).
Always looking dapper as usual Mike 👍
the thumbnail is terrifying
Lol, thanks to your perfect pronunciation yours are the only videos that the auto generated subtitles are perfect
This video was amazing! I'm so glad you did one on some airships, would it be possible if you did a full-length video on the Graf Zeppelin? It's arguably the most successful Zeppelin of all time
Thanks for producing this video! I have a piece of the canvas from Crash Site No. 2
Was just reading about the Italia and Akron yesterday.
I enjoyed this change! Keep it up!
Good old utube, I’m subscribed to your channel but ut doesn’t bring up many new videos. Anyway, thank you for this well sourced lesson on a few of my favorite airships. There are many more with very colorful histories and back stories. The British R101, USA Macon, Graf Zeppelin etc etc. thanks again from Alaska
I remember seeing footage of a 1930's Navy Blimp that was caught up in the wind as it tried to land. The ground crews tried to hold it down and some of the men didn't let go of the ropes but were pulled high into the air only to fall to their tragic deaths. Can't erase seeing that RIP to the brave sailors.
That was the Akron too. I remember 3 guys never let go until it was too late. Only 1 of them survived.
oh no, you’re going to make me obsessed with airships now ahaha 💗
Cool info! Loved it! Thanks!
It's difficult today for people to understand the confidence in the future of rigid airships that prevailed in the 1920s and 30s. With aircraft able to carry just a very few people in hugely uncomfortable conditions over very short distances, the idea of an airship able to carry a few dozen people in luxury for thousands of miles was, in many minds, the future. An Atlantic liner of the skies, but not restricted to ocean travel. Aeronautical design progress has been phenomenally fast. From the Wright brother's first flight of a few hundred feet, to Neil Armstrong stepping on the moon was just 65 years, less than a typical lifetime, from the first flight of the Spitfire to the early design plans for Concord was just seven years.
> Holy f!#k I can see New York!
Holy hell that had me absolutely rolling
congrqatulations. I love your videos. They are always interesting and informative. And narrated in your bubbly manner.
The Hindenburg was an absolutely crazy event in history
The “holy bleep I can see New York!” Cracked me up. 😂
I live near the hangar that housed the Macon. The hangar is currently being restored. I remember touring it back in the early 2000s and it's such a massive structure.
It's too bad that the era of the airship was short lived. Passenger airships specifically looked like a great experience. I'd prefer them over cramped planes where you can barely walk anywhere except to the bathroom or maybe a bar if the plane even offers that, which most planes don't. Sure, planes are faster but I'd rather a more leisurely way of travel and enjoy the experience of moving about and socializing with other passengers. This is also the reason why I prefer ocean liner travel as well. I can just imagine what passenger airships would be like today if they were actually successful.
I actually have a section girder brace of the Shenandoah that was from the infamous looting-- I bought from someone local to me who had it in their family! Additionally, my great great uncle was part of the dirigible/airship program in the Navy and I have some of his original photos of the Shenandoah. He also flew across the Atlantic on the Hindenburg, and I have a few of the official Hindenburg postcards he sent to my family.