No musical accompaniment today but there is a music video at the end!

I have a long-time fascination with dirigibles and zeppelins. They are such an invention of their time. There’s a mad scene in the pre-code film Madame Satan where Jimmy (one of the supporting characters) throws a masked ball inside a dirigible. That might be its own post someday.

This cache of photos is from the U.S. National Archives and most of them were taken in Ohio in 1933 when the USS Akron was being constructed. There are lots of them so I decided to limit this post to the terrifying aspects of a dirigible, but please be advised there is another post coming your way soon about the beauty of these magnificent airships!

Dirigibles were massive. It’s hard to get an idea of the scale of it looking at the first picture, but in the second you’ll see people in the lower right.

What it would be like sailing around in one of these rigid airships? I would imagine it was tiring work but the crew’s accommodations are not luxurious.

One inexplicable photo shows a crew member outside the ship while it’s in the air! It looks like he’s adjusting something, which is also scary. I wonder if that was a regular part of his job? He looks very casual about it.

Perhaps the two most alarming photos I found were of a sailor adjusting something and a lone propeller. Why is a sailor controlling anything? Apart from the flight crew, the only people who can be useful are a priest, a doctor, and possibly a bartender.  As for the tiny propeller, let’s hope it was just for decoration.

If something did go wrong, the dirigible was equipped with an Emergency Control Station. This was a special designated area that was separate from the regular Navigation Room. There’s not a lot of equipment in there. Maybe it’s where they dispensed band-aids.

Despite the terrors of a dirigible, they’re irresistible. If I had an opportunity to ride in one, I would go. I would have a lot of Valium, but I would definitely go!

There is some wonderful footage of the Hindenburg from British Pathé interspersed in this Led Zeppelin video. When the Levee Breaks is their best song!