Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 146, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 June 1910 — AIRSHIP IN FIVE YEARS [ARTICLE]

AIRSHIP IN FIVE YEARS

Prediction Made That It Will Be Capable of Traveling 75 < Miles an Hour. WELL BE TJTTE a FLYING FISH. •■•r Dream of Magazine Writer, the Fulfillment of Which Is Not Beyond Realm of Possibility. From the standard of present development the airship of 1915 may be conceived as having a hull of rigid construction, 1,000 feet long and 80 feet beam, with accommodations for 125 to 150 passengers, with a crew of forty-two men. The new air liner will resemble a submarine, or rather a flying fish, a writer In the Century says. All its parts will be Compactly built Into the hull. Its under body, 800 feet long, 12 feet wide and 9 feet high, will extend between the elbows fore and aft where the hpll begins to curve toward its pointed how and stern. The underbody will hold seven passengers and eight operating sections, after the fashion of a compartment sleeping car. A continuous passageway will extend from end to end. The prow, glazed with artificial mica, will furnish an aerial observatory. Its« interior will be a series of grill galleries, connected by steps. Here will be the "bridge,” the air liner’s nerve center, with signal radiation to all parts of the ship. A narrow gallery will reach the extreme nose, where a small exploring gun, Bwung on--a universal Joint, can be fired toward most points in space. On Its several platforms will be the. navigating deck, the helm, the “wireless,” the chartroom and both meterological and astronomical “observatories.” Below the “bridge” will be a hatchway to the main passage In the forward underbody of the ship, where there is a companion way which is the ship’s portal. A,haft of this will be the captain’s cabin. The sides of the "hold,” or tunnel, five feet high and eight feet wide, will be lined with continuous tanking, containing gasoline fuel, to be forced upward Into the engine rooms, as needed. The outside of the “hold” will serve as the airship’s rounded keel, and will enable the craft to float on water; elastic buffers for landing will be fixed under each engine section. The eight motor compartments will each be equipped with one 200-horse-power motor. The electric power plants, for lighting, •cooking and operating the escalator, will be in the engine compartments. The top of the hull, now the Zeppelin’s observatory, will become a long "hurricane deck” of thin, light planking, with side rails. Here will be kept tervice implements; two slender masts, carrying the "wlrele'sss” atennse and the yellow “top lights”; observatories for cloud triangulation and taking the altitude of stars; winch and the airship’s "boats,” two small, swift aeroplane “scouts” —one fore, the other aft, with ample space •or launching and alighting. Along tho port and starboard sides five sets of curved aeroplane surfaces will help to lift and support the airship or steer it up and down. They will be "stopped” to avoid interference. Between them will be eight small propellers, four on each side, at alternating levels along the hull. It Is believed that within five years such an air liner will be capable of traveling seventy-five miles an hour, ordinarily, and often 120 miles, In the upper levels. In ten years an airship driven fifty miles an hour may perchance make that trip in eight days, flying at a speed of 120 miles an hour, or 3,000 a day. Is It all a dream? Ten years ago a prophecy of the present achievements of German air navigators would have been received with incredulity.