5 ms·

I wonder what's preventing us from having airships now offering cruise like experiences in the sky. The only company I found doing them is OceanSky[1] though it

I wonder what's preventing us from having airships now offering cruise like experiences in the sky. The only company I found doing them is OceanSky[1] though it seems like they are still in the early stages. My guess is they can't carry enough people to make the unit economics work without charging $10k/ticket. [1]: https://oceanskycruises.com/ https://oceanskycruises.com/

Panzer04 3y ago
A precipitous amount of older airships went down due to bad weather. I suspect the risks are too high for modern sensibilities - they just seem too vulnerable.
jcranmer 3y ago
Airships tend to have a problem with poor weather. Of the 5 airships the US Navy used, only one of them lived long enough to be decommissioned, and the other 4 all ended in total structural failure in bad weather. I don't have handy stats for other countries, but I believe it's well in excess of 50% of all airships ending their lives in crashes.
- Aperocky 3y ago
  All 5 of them operated at a time without weather radar, satellite and internet. I'd bet they'd all be safe today by simply not moving into weather systems.
  - jandrese 3y ago
    The flipside is they may not be fast enough to dodge quick moving weather systems.
    - dredmorbius 3y ago
      Or capable of climbing above them. Airships have pretty surprisingly low service ceilings, and experience a huge trade-off in payload capacity (by weight) vs. operating altitude.
  - nine_k 3y ago
    Or, rather, before carbon fiber, kevlar, very strong plastic films, etc. A modern airship can be made much lighter while also being sturdier and somehow structurally redundant. But its sheer size still makes it expensive. The only relatively operational development I'm aware of is Airlander, and it's still a prototype, since the US Army rejected it.
    - giantrobot 3y ago
      The size is part of the problem. An airship's huge size means it has a gigantic sail area. Weather that can't be avoided becomes super dangerous. Even a gentle crosswind during take off or landing could be disastrous.
  - helsinkiandrew 3y ago
    > I'd bet they'd all be safe today by simply not moving into weather systems. It will be safe but of less use than other aircraft/transport that can work in bad weather, or can wait out in a hangar or get in and out of a bad weather system quickly.
billyhoffman 3y ago
Mustard did an awesome analysis of this exactly this: Flying Cruise Ships, why we don’t have giant air ships https://youtu.be/LyaYaFzSPac?si=hZ6HV0YuCOg-WUYT https://youtu.be/LyaYaFzSPac?si=hZ6HV0YuCOg-WUYT Basically, the economics no longer work. Airships really can’t carry that much weight relative to their operational costs. They’re loud and they’re slow which isn’t a great customer experience. The amount of money you would have to pay for a ticket to make it economical would be more than a first class ticket on a modern jet, which would also get you there much faster. (BTW all of Mustard’s videos are great. They have super high production value and are primarily about transportation technologies of the 50s 60s 70s and 80s. I recommend watching it on Nebula if you can.)
- jvanderbot 3y ago
  Cruise ships are a terrible way to get quickly to a destination, but they're not a bad way to travel. Comparing airships to first class air travel isn't the right basis. You want to compare to trains and ships at least. You take a ship or train when speed isn't the objective, rather experience. An airship experience with a few dozen passengers taking tours of beautiful scenery over the course of a coastal trip, or like a group hot air balloon, or something like that.
  - zht 3y ago
    `You take a ship or train when speed isn't the objective, rather experience` not sure if that's the case with HSR

Panzer04 3y ago

A precipitous amount of older airships went down due to bad weather. I suspect the risks are too high for modern sensibilities - they just seem too vulnerable.

jcranmer 3y ago

Airships tend to have a problem with poor weather. Of the 5 airships the US Navy used, only one of them lived long enough to be decommissioned, and the other 4 all ended in total structural failure in bad weather. I don't have handy stats for other countries, but I believe it's well in excess of 50% of all airships ending their lives in crashes.

Aperocky 3y ago
All 5 of them operated at a time without weather radar, satellite and internet. I'd bet they'd all be safe today by simply not moving into weather systems.
- jandrese 3y ago
  The flipside is they may not be fast enough to dodge quick moving weather systems.
  - dredmorbius 3y ago
    Or capable of climbing above them. Airships have pretty surprisingly low service ceilings, and experience a huge trade-off in payload capacity (by weight) vs. operating altitude.
- nine_k 3y ago
  Or, rather, before carbon fiber, kevlar, very strong plastic films, etc. A modern airship can be made much lighter while also being sturdier and somehow structurally redundant. But its sheer size still makes it expensive. The only relatively operational development I'm aware of is Airlander, and it's still a prototype, since the US Army rejected it.
  - giantrobot 3y ago
    The size is part of the problem. An airship's huge size means it has a gigantic sail area. Weather that can't be avoided becomes super dangerous. Even a gentle crosswind during take off or landing could be disastrous.
- helsinkiandrew 3y ago
  > I'd bet they'd all be safe today by simply not moving into weather systems. It will be safe but of less use than other aircraft/transport that can work in bad weather, or can wait out in a hangar or get in and out of a bad weather system quickly.

billyhoffman 3y ago

Mustard did an awesome analysis of this exactly this: Flying Cruise Ships, why we don’t have giant air ships https://youtu.be/LyaYaFzSPac?si=hZ6HV0YuCOg-WUYT https://youtu.be/LyaYaFzSPac?si=hZ6HV0YuCOg-WUYT Basically, the economics no longer work. Airships really can’t carry that much weight relative to their operational costs. They’re loud and they’re slow which isn’t a great customer experience. The amount of money you would have to pay for a ticket to make it economical would be more than a first class ticket on a modern jet, which would also get you there much faster. (BTW all of Mustard’s videos are great. They have super high production value and are primarily about transportation technologies of the 50s 60s 70s and 80s. I recommend watching it on Nebula if you can.)

jvanderbot 3y ago
Cruise ships are a terrible way to get quickly to a destination, but they're not a bad way to travel. Comparing airships to first class air travel isn't the right basis. You want to compare to trains and ships at least. You take a ship or train when speed isn't the objective, rather experience. An airship experience with a few dozen passengers taking tours of beautiful scenery over the course of a coastal trip, or like a group hot air balloon, or something like that.
- zht 3y ago
  `You take a ship or train when speed isn't the objective, rather experience` not sure if that's the case with HSR