When Airships Sailed the Skies

The USS Los Angeles was a rigid airship, designated ZR-3, which was built in 1923–1924 by the Zeppelin company in Friedrichshafen, Germany as war reparation. It was delivered to the United States Navy in October 1924.On its arrival in the United States, its lifting gas was changed from hydrogen to helium, which reduced payload but improved safety. On 25 August 1927, while the Los Angeles was tethered at the Lakehurst high mast, a gust of wind caught her tail and lifted it into colder, denser air that was just above the airship. This caused the tail to lift higher. The crew on board tried to compensate by climbing up the keel toward the rising tail, but could not stop the ship from reaching an angle of 85 degrees, before it descended. The ship suffered only slight damage and was able to fly the next day.As the terms under which the Allies permitted the US to have the Los Angeles restricted its use to commercial and experimental purposes only, when the U.S. Navy wanted to use the airship in a fleet problem in 1931 permission had to be obtained from the Allied Control Commission. The Los Angeles took part in Fleet Problems XII (1931) and XIII (1932), although as was the case with all U.S. Navy rigid airships, demonstrated no particular benefit to the fleet.The Los Angeles was decommissioned in 1932 as an economy measure, but was recommissioned for a period after the USS Akron crashed in April 1933. Soon returned to storage, the airship was struck off the Navy list in 1939 and dismantled in its hangar, thus ending the career of the Navy's longest serving rigid airship. Unlike the Shenandoah, Akron, and Macon, the Los Angeles' career did not meet a disastrous end. In this painting the airship flies out of Lakehurst over the Bluffs Hotel, much to the delight of the beachgoers.

Image size: 14x19.

Giclee print. Limited edition of 200. Unsigned.

$125