Capt's and F/O's needed soon
01-13-2007, 10:06 AM
#11
Prime Minister/Moderator
Joined APC: Jan 2006
Position: Engines Turn Or People Swim
Posts: 40,382
Anything is a target for terrorism... I'd be much more concerned about how such a craft would survive storms/severe weather. It's not like you can just land and tie something that big down... but then again they somehow managed to do it with the blimps/dirigibles of old...
Actually, the old dirigibles were phased out due to inability to withstand weather. Look up the history of the US Navy's airship program...most of their large airships were destroyed by storms.
But they could be entirely viable today...we have the ability to see the wx coming in adavance! NEXRAD would have probably saved the Navy program if it had been available in the 1930's. Also new materials and engines can provide modern airships with effeciency gains over their ancestors. All we really need is a viable commercial application, of which there are several possibilities: airborn cruise ships, cargo delivery to remote locations, surviellence, border/pipeline patrol, etc.
Note: The german airship program died because they had no source of the inert gas helium (unlike the US where it is naturally available). They were forced to use explosive hydrogen...you know the rest of this story
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