Word: zr3
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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...ZR3 left Lakehurst early one morning and reached the Anacostia Naval Air Station near Washington two hours before the Presidential party was scheduled to welcome it. Accordingly, Commander J. M. Klein gave Washington a treat by a peaceful two-hour cruise over the city. When the time finally came for the ceremonies, the ZR3 misbehaved disgracefully. Six hours flight had made a dent in the fuel supply carried on board, and the huge dirigible was too light and buoyant. Several hundred sailors hanging on heavy tow lines could not haul her down, and when one of the tow lines snapped...
Dreadnoughts then superdread-noughts; airships, now superairships. The Shenandoah and the ZR3 with their 2,00,000 cu. ft. of gas or so, their lifting capacity of 150,000 Ib. will soon appear small and insignificant. Airships improve with size; the larger they are, the faster they can go and the greater the proportion of commercial load they can carry relative to their gross weight. Accordingly, the Good-year-Zeppelin Co. is planning on a 5,000,000 cu. ft. ship and the British are actually starting work on two ships of equal size...
...Coolidge vetoed all plans for a Polar flight. Now that the U. S. has two large dirigibles in its possession, and such perfect command of both ships has been demonstrated again and again, there is revived talk of the expedition. General Mason M. Patrick in fact wants the ZR3 transferred to the Army, and a race between ZR3 and Shenandoah "to either the North or the South Pole." There would be sufficient thrill to a polar flight even without the element of a race. If a mooring mast and hangars were erected at Nome, Alaska, the actual distance...
...cost $40 per 1,000 cu. ft. In reality, it costs the Government very nearly $160 per 1,000 cu. ft.; and, since only 1% of helium is present in the most richly endowed sources of natural gas, it must always be expensive. In the Atlantic crossing, the ZR3 used up 30% of its hydrogen. Even with recovery of the gases in the exhaust to compensate for loss of weight by fuel, thus dispensing with the "valving" of gas to meet changes in weight, there will always be a large expenditure of helium...
...receiving stations began picking up intelligible wireless messages from the ZR3 soon after she passed "the top of the hill," as mariners call the halfway line between the two Continents. The first message ran: "Alles wohl an bord schiff" (All well on board ship...