Speaking as SLF, it's a little worrying to wonder what would happen to us passengers if the self-prick (as it were) system kicked in before we'd got out. Would we just be spilled out into the sky along with the luggage?

One presumes it’s unlikely to break away from it’s moorings ‘at altitude’???

I was sorry to see that this had happened. Can anyone explain the mechanism for deflating and yet retaining the helium? Aka "making it safe". Since helium cannot be manufactured and has to be mined from finite resources, there will be a significant impact from wasting a football pitch cubed worth of helium into the atmosphere unless somehow there is a pressurizing system which is part of the "making safe" procedure. This is no doubt possible but unlikely in the event of an emergency deflation. I'd be happy to be reassured.

Interesting article here on the availability and production of Helium.

http://www.madehow.com/Volume-4/Helium.html

It's a bit out of date as it states we should have run out of the stuff two years ago!

Artificial manufacture is possible but it's expensive.

Link please?

And yes, I remember reading a very cross New Scientist editorial about fifteen years ago that berated the use of helium in party balloons etc., given that the world is running out of it and it's crucially needed for things such as MRI machines and other gadgets that rely on superconductivity.

So when I first read about this event, my first thought was also "what a colossal waste of all that helium".

No, but there is such a thing in the world as "accidental deployment" and, in the unlikely event that I were to be travelling in one of these things, this would now concern me.

Fourteen months:
One flight;
Two crashes.

Not quite ready for a stock market flotation, methinks.

Has Allianz computed the new insurance premium yet?

Does there ever come a point when the CAA airworthiness people say "Enough is enough. Stop it!"?

What a shame. Two disasters during a flight test programme. Sorry to say, but this must be the end of the road for the project. Perhaps someone will harvest some useful learning, whether about buoyancy, flight test, risk management, business, or listening more intently to history lessons...

The efficacy of oversight from the CAA is one aspect; of course, a thorough investigation into the crash might have uncovered weaknesses there, if one had taken place.

Obviously, if the system tears open the envelope to make the blimp non-buoyant, then helium will be lost. My speculation is that making it safe is reference to compressed helium contained in pressure vessels as a part of on-board buoyancy controls. Anyone know if such exist on the Airlander?

https://scontent.fltn1-2.fna.fbcdn.n...84&oe=5AA1786F

If the reports of it committing suicide to prevent it being a danger to the local area, or other air traffic are correct, that's great, but it really doesn't look like a realistic solution.

Good luck with that. People are still trying to invent flying cars despite a half century or so of it having been demonstrated that:

Yes, it is technologically possible.
No, it doesn't make a very good airplane.
No, it doesn't make a very good car.
No, there's not much practical application.
No, it's not a commercially viable device.

on the other hand...

https://newatlas.com/helium-source-n...-fields/39038/

Once they crack nuclear fusion, there'll be plenty of helium.

It's customary for an elegant aircraft's shape to be incorporated into a logo or emblematic image.

The above image shows this anachronistic waste of money to look like a splodge of tuberculotic phlegm.

At first, images of the wretched thing made it look like an arse.

Then they took it outdoors and really made an arse of it.

ITYM fusion...

Or a flaccid failure

Ho ho ho. I see what you did there.

https://media.treehugger.com/assets/...crop-smart.jpg

The gas inside airlander is at very low pressure. There are helium bags and air bags. As the helium bags inflate at altitude the air is let out to keep the outer balloon from bursting. On descending air is pumped into the air bags to keep the ballo

... balloon rigid. I’m sure emergency deflation would require venting most, of not alll of the helium and air. I m sure there is no way of compressing it. Imagine the size and weight of the cylinders! I seem to recall from my visit that the cost of the helium to fill it is about £250,000. They reckoned to replace about 10% each year. 😢 I guess they may be covered by insurance.

For all of the keyboard warriors questioning the automatic deflation.

It is a regulatory requirement.