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World's Largest Aircraft Crashes Its Second Flight (theverge.com)
Not too long after it completed its first test flight, the Airlander 10 -- the world's largest aircraft -- has crashed its second test flight. Since the 300-foot long aircraft contains 38,000 cubic meters of helium inside its hull, the crash was all but sudden. You can see in a video posted to YouTube from witnesses on the ground that the aircraft slowly descended to the ground, nose first. The BBC has published some close-up photos of the cockpit, which sustained damages. There were no injuries in the crash, according to a tweet from Hybrid Air Vehicles. The company did also deny eyewitness reports of the aircraft being damaged in a collision with a telegraph pole.
Building these things that are at the mercy of the elements is a bad idea.
This is the set of all things.
Now get out of my cave.
Yes but still a step below the semi-rigid airships like the Italians had in the 1920s (Norge, Italia) or the rigid airships, both of which have smaller relative cross section again.
The bit about fans doesn't sound like anything new to be honest the engines are less powerful there are less of them so don't add up to the same thrust as was seen in airships which had engines that could pivot in a similar way to this. One airship of the 1920s had five engines - each 410 kW (550 hp). Airlander 10 apparently has four x 350 hp.
An MRI machine needs 1,700 litres of liquid helium, which needs to be topped off regularly. That's the equivalent of 12,724 cubic meters. The airship needs 38,000 cubic meters of helium, which I assume also needs to be topped off regularly.
In other words, the airship uses Helium at the rate of three MRI machines (according to my layman calculation). I'm not making a judgement one way or another. I just wanted to quantify the comparison.