JF Ptak Science Books Quick Post
[Cross section for what would be His Majesty's airship R100 (I think), from Popular Mechanics, January 1929.]
At first this image looked like the cover of one of Hugo Gernsbach's science fiction magazines given the number of dining tables and sleeping quarters, but no--it is the front cover of the January 1929 issue of Popular Mechanics showing what I believe would be a cross section of the airship R100. It would be easy to assume that this was an artist's creative attempt to show the interior of a rigid airship sometime in the future, given the size and scope of the accommodations for the passengers. But as it turns out, it is a drawing of the interior of what I'm pretty sure would become the British airship R100. The article appeared just months after the first commercial transatlantic rigid airship flight, a 111-hour accomplishment by the Graf Zeppelin (LZ-127). Seven months later, in August, the LZ-127 would make the first around the world flight in 21 days. The R100's first flight would occur four months later on 18 December 1929, all 719' feet of her (with a massive 133' diameter), with her crew of 37.
[I'm not an historian of rigid airships or of flight in general, but it looks to me that the cross section is in accordance with others showing the interior of the R100. Correctly identified or not, the image of the concept is lovely]
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