Rigid Airship - United States

United States

The United States rigid airship program was mostly based at Lakehurst Naval Air station, New Jersey. USS Shenandoah (ZR-1) was one of the first of these rigid airships, serving from 1923 to 1925, when it was torn about in severe weather killing 14 of the crew. ZR-2 was a British airship intended to join the naval fleet, but it crashed on a trial flight 1921 before it could be delivered to the States. Forty-four of those on board died. USS Los Angeles (ZR-3) was a German airship, sold to the United States in 1924. The ship was grounded in 1931, due to the Depression, but was not dismantled for over 5 years. The sister ships Akron and Macon both crashed after technical failure. The Akron was flown into the sea in bad weather and broke up. Over seventy were killed, including one of the US Navy's proponents of airships - Rear Admiral Moffett. Macon also ended up in the sea when it flew into heavy weather with unrepaired damage from an earlier incident, but the introduction of life-jackets following the loss of the Akron meant only two lives were lost.

These crashes ended the rigid airship program.

Read more about this topic:  Rigid Airship

Famous quotes related to united states:

    ... while one-half of the people of the United States are robbed of their inherent right of personal representation in this freest country on the face of the globe, it is idle for us to expect that the men who thus rob women will not rob each other as individuals, corporations and Government.
    Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906)

    Steal away and stay away.
    Don’t join too many gangs. Join few if any.
    Join the United States and join the family
    But not much in between unless a college.
    Robert Frost (1874–1963)

    Of all the nations in the world, the United States was built in nobody’s image. It was the land of the unexpected, of unbounded hope, of ideals, of quest for an unknown perfection. It is all the more unfitting that we should offer ourselves in images. And all the more fitting that the images which we make wittingly or unwittingly to sell America to the world should come back to haunt and curse us.
    Daniel J. Boorstin (b. 1914)

    Ethnic life in the United States has become a sort of contest like baseball in which the blacks are always the Chicago Cubs.
    Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)

    In no other country in the world is the love of property keener or more alert than in the United States, and nowhere else does the majority display less inclination toward doctrines which in any way threaten the way property is owned.
    Alexis de Tocqueville (1805–1859)