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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.
or did it?
the aircraft slowly descended to the ground, nose first.
It seems clear why this will leave less of an impact historically than the Hindenburg.
Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.
Ernest Hemingway
Every other blimp/helicopter hybrid crashed pretty early on, so this is hardly unexpected. The fundamental problem with all lighter than air craft has been landing, taking off, or being handled on or near the ground. It is an intrinsic weakness that cannot be overcome.
"Oh, the humanity!"
Have gnu, will travel.
Call that an airship, or something, please. Even though this picture reminds me of a very flexible girlfriend of mine.
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
Isn't helium that same stuff needed for MRI machines that I keep hearing is in short supply?
the real tragedy here is not the crash, but the fact that 38000 cubic meters of a very rare gas used for everything from advanced medical diagnostics to research into superconductors and even nuclear fusion is squandered into a single aircraft that cant be bothered to run through a computational fluid thermodynamics simulation before enjoying public humiliation.
im sure it sounds callous, but i hope this thing takes a life next time because clearly no ones thought through the ramifications of such a wasteful endeavour.
Good people go to bed earlier.
Building these things that are at the mercy of the elements is a bad idea.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Blimps suck, actual news at 11.
...drums fingers ... ...checks watch ... ... ...ties shoelaces ... ... ...
*cough*
HUMANITY!
the real tragedy here is not the crash, but the fact that 38000 cubic meters of a very rare gas used for everything from advanced medical diagnostics to research into superconductors and even nuclear fusion is squandered into a single aircraft that cant be bothered to run through a computational fluid thermodynamics simulation before enjoying public humiliation.
im sure it sounds callous, but i hope this thing takes a life next time because clearly no ones thought through the ramifications of such a wasteful endeavour.
Hypothetically speaking, suppose someone offered you a job at that company (and you lived near enough for an easy commute, and so on) for $100,00/yr. Would you take it?
Or would you refuse, knowing that the helium could be put to better use in other ways?
Now suppose you own an MRI company. Do you spend part of your profits purchasing stores of Helium for future use, or do you pocket the profits (or give it to shareholders) and hope that societal pressure will fix the problem sometime in the future?
Or that governments will step in and do something about the Helium supply?
Welcome to capitalism.
Really? They flew into a telegraph pole? When were they flying it, 1937?
Attention ladies and gentleman and all the ships at sea! The Hun is invading Europe, but airship travel is SAFE!
-- You are in a maze of little, twisty passages, all different... --
Ow, my butt!
After watching the video, it reminded me of other things crashing very, very slowly. Though this one wasn't quite as entertaining.
How does this thing qualify as an "aircraft" rather than "airship"?
I totally agree. That was the lamest crash vid I've ever seen.
Regardless of how much ground crew (an expense, by the way, that Airlander is designed to minimize) you have, blimps are not supposed to land nose down. This is a Problem(TM) that needs to be investigated and fixed.
"99 dead duelists of Dios on the wall. 99 dead duelists of Dios! Take one's ring, pass it around..."
Wasted? It's still all contained in the airship. If someone needs it for another use, they can buy it.
...fucked their game well and truly!
Airships are marvellous, nearly perfect aircraft for applications where speed is not vital and severe weather is not an issue.
So, never?
"Our two-party system is like a bowl of shit looking at itself in a mirror." - Lewis Black
When a fully inflated lighter than air-ship crashes, does it bounce?
This is what used to be LEMV (long endurance multi-intelligence vehicle). Very expensive attempt at long-loiter reconnaissance. Cost the US tax payer many many millions, and was cancelled and the thing was sold back the original builder for $301k. https://www.flightglobal.com/n.... Reminds me of the telcom bubble back in the early 2000's except this was a bubble of helium.
Oh, and the helium thing - possibly overrated - more found: http://www.wired.com/2016/06/d.... Also it can be a by-product of natural gas production, just a low percentages.
Ryanair is going to order fifty of them.
They call this thing the world's largest aircraft but it's TINY compared to the Hindenburg
Pain is merely failure leaving the body
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.
A quick wikipedia search show that the USS Akron had eight Maybach VL-II 560 hp (420 kW) engines while the Airlander 10 has four x 350 hp engines.
It's a step in front of some other current small blimps but has less ability to thrust itself down than airships of the past.
Hindenbutt: Oh the huge-fannity!
Table-ized A.I.
Rename it "Butty McButtface"
Table-ized A.I.
That's great if you only want to land where a ground vehicle already exists.
Somewhat limiting requirement though don't you think?
Although I'm sure you thought of that already down the pub with your napkin.
Because an airship is a type of aircraft, ignoramus.
It's a bit hard to do a comparison on anything other than raw thrust especially since the weight is going to be around the same once the things are full of gas.
On a still day the Akron or any of the others would have far "more ability to anchor itself down with its fans" than the Airlander even if they would perform differently in other ways.
That's kind of one of my points about the hype. Good on them for doing this but all the hype about it being an amazing new thing that Grandad would goggle at is a bit much.
I'll add that calling this a "crash", like the journalists have been, is a bit like calling a ship that hits a dock hard and does some damage a "sinking".
The Hindenburg isn't an aircraft. Well, not any more anyway. I know Slashdot is a bit slow reporting news but it caught fire and crashed 80 years ago.
It's never too late to have a happy childhood.
Also it's going to be the profile exposed to wind and not volume that would matter and while that would be larger it's going to be closer to two times than five times - similar to cross sectional area from the direction of wind instead of volume. If the thing is going forward it could be much less since than the current blimp since the Akron etc were much more streamlined and is around the same maximum diameter. Almost pencil versus grid-iron football profile, just a really big pencil as thick as a football.
On a still day moving down slowly it's not going to be much so is ignorable when there is a very large difference in thrust.
The most amazing part about that video: they recorded it in Landscape mode!!!
"Any landing you can walk away from is a good landing."
Yep, and it's a great landing if they can reuse the plane.
Duh! It carries the ground vehicle with it and drops it by parachute or with a bit of string.
It's true I tell you, feller at work's next door neighbour read it in the paper.
did it have airbags?
They barely had time to polish up all the brightwork, update the log books, phone their friends and family, post about it on facebook, take a leisurely walk around the control cabin, watch some TV and then strap in to wait for the end.
There is no God, and Dirac is his prophet.
Which will make the one liner jokes that much more funny.
...the crash was all but sudden.
Am I the only one who finds this worse than using a double negative?
"all but sudden"? So every other possibility but sudden? Does that include immediate or instantaneous? Am I the only one here who wasn't sure on first reading whether the crash was quick or slow?
Is this an americanism? i.e. the use of 'did' to clumsily change a present-tense verb into past-tense, instead of just using the past-tense form of the verb (e.g. 'denied' rather than 'did deny' or 'also denied' rather than 'did also deny').
At first i thought it was just bad writing, but I've been seeing it a lot lately.
The Hindenburg isn't an aircraft. Well, not any more anyway. I know Slashdot is a bit slow reporting news but it caught fire and crashed 80 years ago.
Every damn "biggest" ship, plane, tower or building that we've constructed in the past 50 years has been bigger, usually MUCH bigger than anything built 80 or more years ago, so what exactly is your point?
The legendary structures of yesteryear are ordinary or unremarkable compared to what we're capable of building now.
The Titanic *might* land somewhere in the bottom half of 100 biggest ever cruise ships; the storied (sorry) Empire State Bldg is 30th tallest
Pain is merely failure leaving the body
Not so much with airships. The age of airships is long over and despite the occasional attempt to bring them back, it will probably never return. The Hindenburgs-class of airships still stands as the largest airships ever built and it's likely that record will never be broken.