RAF Airships downunder?

Thanks Mark and Alastair,

Very interesting indeed. Had R.101 not crashed a great service would undoubtedly have eventually been formed. Another of those great ‘what if’s.

Cheers
Dave

My book didn’t specifically mention mooring masts in Australia, but it did talk about the planned route to from Britain to Oz and about the advances in mast design…

as for the R.101, it was apparently a bit of a duff design and over-weight (in part due to the plush carpets that I think the Air Minister, Lord Thomson, insisted on :rolleyes: ).

Thomson also hurried up the R.101’s maiden flight to India as he had hopes of becoming the next Viceroy and sought to impress the locals. Who know what would have happened if there’d been more tests…

The R.100, on the other hand, had a radical geodesic structure, designed by Barnes Wallis, which resurfaced in the Wellington.

(It’s a big year for airship anniversaries. Sunday saw the 75th anniversary of the Graf Zeppelin’s round the world flight and it’s also the 85th anniversary of the R.34 making the first East to West flight of the Atlantic.)

Thanks Mark and Alastair,

Very interesting indeed. Had R.101 not crashed a great service would undoubtedly have eventually been formed. Another of those great ‘what if’s.

Cheers
Dave

Aussie Airship Stations

Dave,

in “These are Facts” the autobiography of Air Marshall Sir Richard Williams RAAF, he mentions the interest in airships as early as 1918 with an airship station in Sydney and Melbourne proposed but not proceeded with, in what was the eventual creation of the RAAF in 1921. (page 114)

He later mentions in regard to a trip to Canada/USA in 1924 and and partcularly a visit to the Airship Station at Lakehurst New Jersey “My visit here was of personal interest only for whilst Britain was planning an airship service to Australia by way of India for the future, the airships proposed were far too high a cost to be of any attraction to Australia” (page 160)

He addresses this issue in more detail (page 203) relating to the period of 1930/31 of your own interest ….. .”Following the conclusion of the 14-18 war the British government and also the Governments of the United States and Germany had been pressing on with the development of large rigid airships for international trade. In this Germany led with the Zeppelins similar to those used by her during the war. British airships crossed the Atlantic to Canada and return and the Government was now planning a regular service form England to India. Mooring masts had been constructed in both places and the plan visualised an extension to Australia later. For this service the British Government placed orders for two airships, one to be built by private enterprise and one by the government, they were known as R100 and R101 respectively.

The then Secretary of State for Civil Aviation in London, Lord Thomson was anxious that the service to India be commenced in time to allow him to travl by it and be back in England for an election due to be held soon. The fact that it was planned that this service be extended to Australia caused me to suggest that our liason officer in London, Squadron Leader W Palstra, travl on the first flight. It is possible we were offered a place on it but I cannot remember this with certainty. The Director General of Civil Aviation in London, Sir Sefton Brancker, was also a passenger.

It appears that due to a race against time the R101 was not subjected to the thorough tesitng it might otherwise have had and before it got far into France it crashed, causing the loss of many lives inlcuding those of Thomson, Branker and Palstra. Although the R100 flew from Cardington to Montreal and return, the loss of R101 resulted in the British Government refusing funds for further development of airships and theat was the end of the use of lighter-than-ar craft in British civil aviation.”

It would seem then that the crash of the R101 terminated both the England to India and future extension of service to Australia/NZ, and with it the need for Mooring stations.

regards

Mark P

Tonight on a NZ National Radio programme “Sounds Historical” in the today-in-history section there was a snippet about how on the 29th of August 1928 some representatives from the RAF arrived in New Zealand with a view of establishing an Airship mooring station for their airships to visit. Apparently it never went ahead because the Australians didn’t set up any on their east coast.

The question was put by the presenter, Jim Sullivan, were any set up on the west coast of Australia then? or was the RAF refused altogether by Australia?

Does anyone know, were any mooring stations for RAF airships ever established in Aussie?

From the date, it strikes me that they would have been intended for use by the R100 and R101. As the R101 blew up on its first flight and the British airship programme was then cancelled, it may be be cause of them never being used.

I’ve got a book on airships and aircraft that was published in 1930. I’ll see if there’s anything in it tonight.

Cheers

Alistair