My Airships/Chapter 20
AN ACCIDENT AND ITS LESSONS
AT half-past two o'clock on the afternoon of the 14th of February 1902 the staunch air-ship which won the Deutsch prize left the aerodrome of La Condamine on what was destined to be its last voyage.
Immediately on quitting the aerodrome it began behaving badly, dipping heavily. It had left the balloon house imperfectly inflated, hence it lacked ascensional force. To keep my proper altitude I increased its diagonal pointing and kept the propeller pushing it on upward. The dipping, of course, was due to the counter effort of gravity.
In the shaded atmosphere of the aerodrome the air had been comparatively cool. The balloon was now out in the hot, open sunlight. As a consequence, the hydrogen nearest to the silk cover rarefied rapidly. As the balloon had left the aerodrome imperfectly inflated the rarefied hydrogen was able to rush to the highest possible point—the up - pointing stem. This exaggerated the inclination which I had made purposely. The balloon pointed higher and higher. Indeed, for a time, it seemed almost to be pointing perpendicularly.
Before I had time to correct this "rearing up" of my aerial steed many of the diagonal wires had begun to give way, as the slanting pressure on them was unusual, and others, including those of the rudder, caught in the propeller.
Should I leave the propeller to grind on the rigging the balloon envelope would be torn the next moment, the gas would leave the balloon in a mass, and I would be precipitated into the waves with violence.
I stopped the motor. I was now in the position of an ordinary spherical balloonist—at the mercy of the winds. These were taking me in shore, where I would be presently cast upon the telegraph wires, trees, and house corners of Monte Carlo.
There was but one thing to do.
Pulling on the manœuvre valve I let out a sufficient quantity of hydrogen and came slowly down to the surface of the water, in which the air-ship sank.
Balloon, keel, and motor were successfully fished up the next day and shipped off to Paris for repairs. Thus abruptly ended my maritime experiments; but thus also I learned that, while a properly inflated balloon, furnished with the proper valves, has nothing to fear from gas displacement, it is best to be on the safe side and guard oneself against the possibility of such displacement, when by some neglect or other the balloon is allowed to go out imperfectly inflated.
For this reason, in all my succeeding air-ships, the balloon is divided into many compartments by vertical silk partitions, not varnished. The partitions remaining unvarnished, the hydrogen gas can slowly pass through their meshes from one compartment to another to ensure an equal pressure throughout. But as they are, nevertheless, partitions, they are always ready to guard against any precipitous rushing of gas toward either extremity of the balloon.
Indeed, the experimenter with dirigible balloons must be continually on his guard against little errors and neglects of his aids. I have four men who have now been with me four years. They are in their way experts, and I have every confidence in them. Yet this thing happened: the air-ship was allowed to leave the aerodrome imperfectly inflated. Imagine, then, what might be the danger of an experimenter with a set of inexperienced subordinates.
In spite of their great simplicity my air-ships require constant surveillance on a few capital heads:
Is the balloon properly filled?
Is there any possibility of a leak?
Is the rigging in condition?
Is the motor in condition?
Do the cords commanding rudder, motor, water ballast, and the shifting guide rope work freely?
Is the ballast properly weighed?
Looked on as a mere machine the air-ship requires no more care than an automobile, but, from the point of view of consequences, the need of faithful and intelligent surveillance is simply imperious. This very day all the highways of France are dotted with a thousand automobiles en panne, with their enthusiastic drivers crawling underneath them in the dust, oil-can and wrench in hand, repairing momentary accidents. They think no less of their automobile for this reason. Yet let the air-ship have the same trifling accident and all the world is likely to hear of the fact.
In the first years of my experiments I insisted on doing everything for myself. I "groomed" my balloons and motors with my own hands. My present aids understand my present air-ships, and nine times out of ten they hand them over to me in good condition for the voyage. Yet were I to begin experiments with a new type I should have to train them all anew, and during that time I should have to care for the air-ships with my own hands again.
On this occasion the air-ship left the aerodrome imperfectly weighed and inflated, not so much by the neglect of my men as by reason of the imperfect situation of the aerodrome. In spite of the care that had been given to designing and constructing it, from the very nature of its situation there was no space outside in which to send up the air-ship and ascertain if its ballast were properly distributed. Could this have been done the imperfect inflation of the balloon would have been perceived in time.
Looking back over all my varied experiences I reflect with astonishment that one of my greatest dangers passed unperceived, even by myself hat the end of my most successful flight over the Mediterranean. .png)
"MY PRESENT AIDS UNDERSTAND MY PRESENT AIRSHIPS"
MOTOR OF "No. 6"
the water, and they were pulling it still lower by means of the guide rope, until it was not many feet above the smoke-stack of the steam chaloupe—and that smoke-stack was belching red-hot sparks.
Any one of those red-hot sparks might have, ascending, burned a hole in my balloon, set fire to the hydrogen, and blown balloon and myself to atoms.