The Hindenburg Disaster (1937)

the Hindenburg disaster may 6th 1937 it's the early hours of September 3rd 1916 high above st. Albans deep in the English countryside a giant silhouette silently seeks cover in the clouds and suddenly a massive search lights light up the sky moments later an aircraft of the British Home Defense Force targets the Zeppelin Raider that is attempting to bomb the town below the aircraft finally gets within range of the Zeppelin and opens fire with its special incendiary ammunition almost instantly the Zeppelin crumples into a blazing fire ball and plummets downwards falling apart as it does so the Zeppelin raids on Britain during World War one in strategic terms were largely ineffectual causing little damage but for a short time they caused terror and much concern to the British military and the general public it also underlined the potential that aerial bombing might have is a military tool to wage war the obvious problem with airships was that they would never be fast enough and never be able to carry a useful enough bomb load following the war initially there was very little airship development though by the mid 1920s engineers returned to designing airships again trying to exploit their one true advantage their incredible range but it quickly became obvious that it would never be practical for the mass market but Mura transport that offered luxury travel with a global reach for the elite who could afford it as for the military they persevered with its reconnaissance and scouting potential as an airship could stay aloft for days and potentially weeks at a time still both the civil and military operators kept running into the same two basic flaws with airships they kept crashing or exploding one of the things that caused them to crash was that they were simply too fragile and the need to save weight compounded this problem further as for exploding their use of highly flammable hydrogen may seem to be an odd choice but it was cheap and readily available the only real alternative was helium though this was relatively safe it was very expensive and not some available after several disasters all the major nations started to turn their back on the airship concept seeing it as unworkable but there was one nation that did and that was Germany the Germans had pioneered the Zeppelin's way back in 1906 and they were sufficiently capable enough to be used to fly to Britain and back on bombing raids from 1915 to 1918 in the post war the airship was moderately successful with Germany and most importantly it had a completely clean safety record the giant LZ 127 Graf Zeppelin became a source of national pride with regular passenger flights a successful world tour in 1929 and a trip to the Arctic in 1931 so when all other nations had abandoned the airship concept Germany felt confident that with the use of advanced technology they could overcome the problems other nations had encountered so Germany decided to build a new generation of giant airships the first of these was given the highest honor and named after general paul von hindenburg the decorated war hero and the president of germany during the ship's construction so the lz-129 Hindenburg was built with the utmost emphasis on safety and cutting-edge design but also on grandeur and vanity the design team was led by the experienced Zeppelin designer dr. Luke Vick do using duralumin a new copper aluminum alloy throughout the ship's frame as it was stronger and more durable and crucially it had been originally intended to use the much safer helium gas but this had to be abandoned when America the chief source of helium refused to export it abroad so the design was switched to the cheaper and more widely available hydrogen gas the construction on the lz-129 Hindenburg started in 1931 but was forced to stop when the company building it lift shift Paul Zeppelin went bankrupt the Nazi government offered to pay for his completion as long as it could be used for propaganda purposes and carry the swastika on its fins the Hindenburg was finally ready by 1936 and was 804 feet long had cabins for 50 passengers a crew of 40 and could carry 22,000 pounds of mail cargo it used seven million cubic feet of hydrogen gas had a top speed of 85 miles per hour and arranged in excess of 8,000 miles though the passenger cabins on board the ship were cramped it did have large public rooms as well as a dining room a bar a lounge a writing room and a pressurized smoking room throughout it was opulent ly decorated with stylish design features it was most definitely aimed at the privileged and powerful in society offering only a first-class service the cost of a one-way transatlantic ticket was four hundred dollars about seven thousand one hundred and forty five dollars in today's value in 1936 it started to make transatlantic flights to the United States and took part in propaganda events for Reich ministry for public enlightenment and propaganda like the Berlin Olympics the only problem reported that year was some minor trouble with one of her engines that was quickly rectified on May 3rd 1937 the Hindenburg set out from Frankfurt in Germany on a 3-day 3,900 mile trip to Lakehurst New Jersey in the United States the trip was uneventful and the only holdup was that the Hindenburg's landing was delayed by a few hours in order to avoid several thunderstorms at 7:21 the Hindenburg came in to land and dropped her mooring lines that were promptly grabbed by a team of ground handlers then without warning four minutes later the Hindenburg bursts into flames and in less than 30 seconds the airship had crashed to the ground engulfed in fire by some miracle of the 97 passengers and crew members on that trip only 35 were killed plus there was one more death and that was a member of the ground crew killed by the falling airship the majority of those kills were sadly burnt to death while a few died while trying to escape while jumping from the airship when it was still high above the ground virtually all of the crew inside the hull were killed as for the passenger decks and the compartments attached below as the airship came crashing down it had landed on its starboard side therefore allowing the majority of the passengers and crew on the opposite side the port side to escape the people on a starboard side were far less lucky a light wind pushed the fire away from the portside towards them to make matters worse part of the burning hull collapsed on top of the starboard side decks and compartments finally their fate was truly sealed as suddenly the sliding doorway to the escape stairway became jammed very few people made it out of that part of the airship alive but there was one factor that worked in the favour of the passengers and crew that accounted for why there were more survivors than you'd might expect that was that hydrogen burned sharply upwards due to its buoyancy whereas most other fuels are far more destructive around the general area of the fire though many of those that survived were still badly burned a reporter named Herbert Morrison was recording a radio broadcast at the time and said after it was suddenly engulfed in flames this is the worst of the worst catastrophes in the world oh it's flames crashing oh four or five hundred feet into the sky and it's it's a terrific crash ladies and gentlemen it's smoke and it's in flames now and the frame is crashing to the ground not quite to the mooring mast oh the humanity the Hindenburg's demise was sudden but what had caused the explosion the truth of the matter as we simply don't know the various boards of enquiries and Commission's that were held afterwards could not come to a definitive conclusion as to why the Hindenburg suddenly burst into flames and exploded due to the political climate and the sensationalism of the newspapers at the time sabotage was a favored explanation but apart from a few threatening letters before the ship took off there was nothing to support this theory but interestingly the head of the company that made it as well as the American commander of the base where the Hindenburg was landing at the time of the explosion and the commander of the Hindenburg itself all thought it was sabotage lightning was another theory put forward as the Hindenburg was venting hydrogen at the time as a part of its landing procedure there were thunderstorms in the area but these storms work quite a ways away this would have been very plausible if it was not for the fact that thousands of people were watching the Hindenburg at the time not one reported a lightning strike on the airship for that matter no one saw any lightning in the sky at the time of the landing another theory was a problem with one of the engines was thought at one stage to be letting off sparks but as the ignition point of hydrogen is quite high and sparks like this would be over 200 centigrade below hydrogen's ignition point the theory was never taken seriously a favored explanation is the static charge theory but it's complicated and would have to have a number of factors in place to have happened and then there was little chance it would have caused the ignition needed to cause the explosion other theories considered and dismissed where the airship hull was punctured causing vast amounts of gas to escape and ignite or that there was a diesel fuel leak from the engines but maybe the explanation is simply that hydrogen airships are inherently unsafe dr. Hugo Eckener a former Zeppelin pilot who was heavily involved at airship development in Germany would later say after the Hindenburg disaster that if he ever designed an airship again he would never consider using hydrogen as a floatation source under any circumstances but there would be no more airships after the Hindenburg disaster as the military and the public lost confidence in the whole concept and the last great airship the Graf Zeppelin to sistership to the Hindenburg was scrapped in 1940 and was used to build German wartime fighter aircraft [Music] [Music]

Channel: Simple History

Views: 1,944,333

Keywords: simple history, animated history, educational, education, airship, hindeburg disaster, Zeppelin, rich, elite, wealthy, passengers, germany, engineer, luxury travel, Hydrogen, USS Akron, Helium, USS Shenandoah, Dixmude, LZ-127, Graf Zeppelin, LZ-129, Ludwig Durr, design, United States, transatlantic, Berlin Olympics, transatlantic flights, vacation, holiday, Frankfurt, Lakehurst, New Jersey, Oh, the humanity, Herbert Morrison, probe, Graf Zeppelin II, Hugo Eckener, story, epic story, luft, new york

Id: QjlGdnolTzw

Length: 10min 33sec (633 seconds)

Published: Wed Dec 26 2018