His Majesty’s Airship – The Life and Tragic Death of the World’s Largest Flying Machine by SC Gwynne, HB 299 pages, 41 B & W illustrations, two maps, Oneworld Publications £25, ISBN 978-086154-708-1
Many readers will be familiar with dramatic newsreel images of the destruction of the German rigid airship LZ 129 Hindenburg at Lakehurst, New Jersey in 1937. No similar record exists of the final moments of the British R.101, seven years earlier in a field in Northern France but it would have been of the same magnitude of horror. These two events bookend a decade when it was still erroneously believed that the giant rigid airship would be a major part of the future of global air travel. It was, perhaps, reasonable to have imagined this 25 years earlier, when fixed-wing aviation was in its infancy. But it was all a pipedream, fuelled by wishful thinking, blind faith, obstinacy, technical weaknesses, unsuitable materials, the combustibility of hydrogen, a blind underappreciation of meteorological reality, over-ambition, hubris and human frailty. The rigid airships were, for all their impressive and imposing bulk, accidents waiting to happen, compounded in the British case by bureaucratic mendacity, political manoeuvres and vanity.
The author is no fan of these behemoths and sets out his stall with clarity and conviction. It is evident from his bibliography that he has carried out diligent research in both primary and secondary sources. In his acknowledgments, he shows that he has consulted the foremost experts, who as I recall, were of equal help to me when researching my books on non-rigid airships.
He tells the story of R.101 in a brisk, journalistic style, which is stimulating, highly readable and enjoyable, delving deeply into the events of the tragic night of 4/5th October 1930. Step by step the events unfold and disaster becomes virtually unavoidable in a patched up, barely serviceable craft which has not been adequately test-flown or properly certified.
It is set against the background of a well-told description of the invention and development of rigid airships in Germany and Britain. The Zeppelins were a failure, as were most of the British rigids and, later, the American helium-filled giants. The only really useful and successful airships were the RNAS blimps in the First World War and the Goodyears of the USN in the Second World War and beyond.
Due respect is paid to the enormous expertise of the Zeppelin master Hugo Eckener, who likened the skill of an airship captain to that of a Master Mariner, both having to have respect for, great knowledge of and a feel for the element in which they cruised.
Excellent pen pictures are drawn of the main participants in the R.101 story, the designers, engineers, officers, crewmen but above all, of Lord Thomson of Cardington, and his irresistible will and desire, which drove the mighty airship to its doom. There is even the intriguing sub-plot of his affair with Princess Marthe Bibesco.
The description of the fiendishly difficult requirements needed to control a rigid and the forces acting against this is a particularly fascinating section of the book, as is scientific detective work in the chapter ‘Solving the Mystery’. The text is enhanced by an excellent selection of photographs and the two very useful maps. I really have no fault to find. I thoroughly enjoyed reading it and have no hesitation in recommending it.
