New Airships for Speed or Heavy Payloads

Glad to see these coming back. Hydrogen is nowhere near as dangerous as gasoline and other fuels. It just explodes and burns up faster. Only one of these flying ships reports to be using helium.

New Generation Airships To Float You From City To City – “Aerospace Adour Technologies, is working with the French post office to study the feasibility of transporting parcels by dirigible. Also in France, Theolia, a company specializing in renewable energy, is financing a dirigible, and plans a test flight across the Atlantic. In Germany, Deutsche Zeppelin-Reederei, the successor to the operator of the Hindenburg, has had success with a new generation of airship it uses to transport sightseers and scientific payloads. The trend is not entirely new. Zeppelin-Reederei carried 12,000 passengers on sightseeing tours over southern Germany last year. Aerophile, a French company that revived tethered balloons, which compete with dirigibles as carriers of passengers, advertising and scientific instruments, was founded by two young French engineers in 1993. The aircraft industry is not exactly bracing for a dogfight. Mr. Massaud says that Emirates and Air France have expressed interest in Manned Cloud. But with top speeds of around 100 miles an hour and a maximum capacity of several dozen passengers, dirigibles are expected by most aviation experts to remain niche vessels for ferrying tourists, advertising and occasional scientific payloads.” – Source

‘Blimp on steroids’ designed to fly through remote skies – “SkyHook International announced Tuesday that it will build the Jess Heavy Lifter (JHL-40) in conjunction with aircraft manufacturer Boeing Co. The JHL-40 takes elements of a blimp and a helicopter to lift up to 40 tonnes in one load and travel up to 320 kilometres without refuelling. It will have a top speed of 70 knots. Company officials said Tuesday the aircraft should help oil and gas companies in particular because they’ll be able to use it to transport equipment and materials without having to build roads in remote regions. “It’s a blimp on steroids because it’s got more than 20,000 horsepower on it and it’s a serious working machine.” The company said that unlike blimps, the airship is neutrally buoyant. “With the empty weight of the aircraft being supported by the helium-filled envelope, the lift provided by four Boeing Model 234 rotors attached to the airframe can be dedicated solely to lifting the payload,” said a fact sheet from the company.” – Source

Construction Begins of the 200 mph, Solar Powered Turtle Airship – “Turtle Airships company announces the beginning of construction iof a demonstration model of a new form for lighter-than-air airships. The airships are not blimps. They are solar powered and will reach speeds of 200 mph. We can save over $100 billion each year on fuel costs alone, another several hundred billion dollars in airport construction, and eliminate a major source of carbon emissions. Airships are a trillion dollar industry, still in its’ infancy, that will grow for decades. Turtle Airships company will change the world aviation industry with 200 mph solar powered airships. Constructed with rigid shelled hulls of aluminum and carbon fiber, the airships look like giant turtles. These “turtle” airships are not blimps or zeppelins. The airships are being designed in Spain and the U.S. Turtle Airships will make a demonstration around-the-world flight of the new solar powered airship in 2009. The airships’ hulls are covered with solar cells which power the airships during daylight hours. For flying at night or cloudy weather, the airships use bio-diesel fueled jet engines as a back-up system. The airships cruise at speeds which are comparable to some airplanes. The airships take off and land straight up and down like a helicopter and are amphibious. They land directly onto the water and take on water ballast for stability like a boat. The airships can land in harbors, rivers, mountain lakes, or the middle of the ocean. The airships will also land on any empty field or at airports, and use built in systems to anchor to the surface without ground crew assistance. Turtle airships do not need huge hangers and can fly in any weather.” – Source