First let me say that I've been fascinated with airships since I was a little kid. My memory banks allow me to clearly recall a time when my dad took me to watch the Goodyear blimp arrive and depart from the Carson, CA airship operations facility when I was about five. Seeing the ship being loaded with passengers and and then flown away into the early evening sky inspired my young imagination. To this day I am reminded of those good memories every time I see the blimp making it's occasional low passes down the runway at KSMO. (Santa Monica, CA) The tower, local pilots and patrons of the airport restaurant are most supportive and appreciative of these impromptu visits. In fact had Goodyear been willing to hire me when I applied, I might well have accepted any reasonable offer that paid the bills.
Having said all though, I consider myself to be a realist and make it a point to separate the sentimental from the practical and the historical from the speculative wherever possible when evaluating the various and sundry ideas proposed in aviation. Many of these ideas are just solutions in search of a problem while others are apparently based in some nostalgic desire to bring back the good old days. Even amongst some of the wilder ideas there exists some semblance of practicality though. It just requires some analysis to determine how much.
Flying cars, alternative power airplanes, flying wings and countless other unconventional aircraft have been built and flown, but to what level of commercial success? Zeppelins and large flying boats crossed the great oceans with paying passengers before land planes could do it. The great steam and sailing ships thrived before that. Moving people and cargo around the world has changed allot in 500 years, but with a constant and unrelenting purpose, namely that the mode of transport chosen most effectively satisfies the goals of the chooser. From the days of Queen Isabella to today's global political/economic/industrial complex, little has changed in that regard. Whatever works best for the intersts of the top brass is what will be done. Count on it.
So with that said: The future for commercial utilization of airships seems likely to remain limited to certain specialized applications. Even during the era of the great dirigibles, the performance and operational utility limitations of this mode of transport were well recognized by the aeronautical research establishments along with both the military and commercial leadership of the day. This recognition may be evidenced in part by the accelerated pace of development of the airplane for both military and commercial use throughout the thirties. Military support for airship development flagged following the US Navy's loss of both the Akron and the Macon within a short time period. The Hindenburg disaster was perhaps the final nail in the coffin for the great dirigibles and marked a turning point in both commercial and public support and investment in future airship technology. As laudable as the accomplishments made in airship technology to this point might have been, further development of the concept was effectively overtaken by events and by the rapidly increasing development of the airplane as both a commercial and military mode of transport. And amid looming signs of impending military conflict on the horizon, airplane development activity skyrocketed in the years just prior to WWII. Airships were largely forgotten in regard to future development.
There are a small number of blimps being used commercially these days. They are utilized primarily for advertizing and televised event coverage. People might pay for a ticket to ride on one, but so far this is not widely done. I can see a few potential uses for large airships, the test of their viability is not that a thing can be done, but whether that thing can be done more profitably by using an airship to do it. While their may indeed be a few such uses for large airships, it seems unlikely that that the scale of these uses would justify the necessary monetary investment to achieve a viable end product. In other words, the unit cost would be too high unless the demand were quite substantial. Hundreds maybe. Of course if the US DOD ran the development, they'd probably end up costing more per unit than an F-22 Raptor and Lockheed Martin or Boeing (the only two non-helicopter prime contractors left) would be the only ones calling it a success!
Anyway, I apologize if my cynicism offends, but if I had a dollar for every new "innovative"aircraft scheme that's gained popularity then promptly stripped investors of their treasure in the last 20 years, I could buy a... well... a good meal for two with drinks anyway!
The more memorable among these must include the Eclipse jet, Day jet, Adam aircraft, Javelin jet, Wheeler Express etc. Never mind the travails of those attempting to keep good proven designs like the AA-5 Tiger in production. I won't even get into the current "green" trend, but mark my words, most of these will go bust too. But at least a few people get to make some money for themselves for awhile as a result I guess. Not that we don't need to work on ways to reduce or transition away from reliance on petroleum based energy sources, but too many of the projects I read about in the aviation rags have all the earmarks of being classic boondoggles if government financed or some form of con if seeking investors. Separating the wheat from the chaff requires knowing something of the technology in question.
So while I wish any serious developer of airship technology the best of success in their endeavors, I don't expect to see airships replacing airplanes or helicopters in any significant way. Airships will retain their niche status alongside all the other bits of historical hardware we've adapted or improved for modern day use. The airship is in good company with the likes of horse drawn carriages, vacuum tube audio amplifiers and ocean going sailing ships. In practical terms all technology follows this path eventually. If humanity remains around long enough, aircraft of all descriptions and most of the rest of what we rely on today will be relegated to classification as historical nostalgia too.
Maybe in 500 years or so, a few people belonging to the local aviation historical society will spend some of their spare time flying around in their fully automated hydrogen fusion powered year 2011 vintage airplane replicas wondering what it must have been like back in the bad old days when noisy smelly engines actually burned petroleum distillates and polluted the atmosphere to move people and cargo about the Earth. And highly specialized people called pilots had to actually know how to manually manipulate crude control mechanisms to get anywhere without crashing. Astounding!
westhawk