Incredible Negligence: the R101 Disaster

My great Grandfather died on that Airship. James (william george) Buck. He was the Batman (personal assistant/butler) to Lord Thomson. This was his first airflight in any air vehicle.. He currently lies in rest at Cardington cemetary. Rip Great Gramps. Ironically i returned to Cardington to work on a military airship prototype in summer 2012 . Although that also crashed (at cardington) it was an unmanned vehicle so only our pride and the company bank account was damaged.

Despite R101's skeleton being largely made of steel, there was still a significant amount of lighter material such as duralumin used in the ship as well. The Zeppelin Company purchased five tons of duralumin from the wreck of R101. It's likely that this material was used in the frame of the Hindenburg.

One of the engineers who worked on the successful R100, and flew on its lauded round trip to Canada and back, was Nevil Shute Norway. After the dirigible program was cancelled because of the disaster of R101, he founded his own airplane company; Airspeed Ltd. He is best known today for his novels, like 'On the Beach' and 'A Town Like Alice'. He wrote in considerable detail of the events surrounding the construction and flights of these airships in his autobiographical, 'Slide Rule'. Those who find this video of interest, will undoubtedly enjoy reading it.

Remember to speaking to very elderly gentleman over twenty years ago, who at the time thought he caused this disaster. During its maiden flight the R101 flew over his garden and as a eight year old he fired his air rifle at it flew over his house.. Even though his low powered air rifle pellet would not have reached 4000 feet as it flew over his garden, he had sleeplessness nights for weeks.

It’s hard to imagine seeing something the size of a cruise ship in the sky. Very steampunk.

My father was 9 years old and in elementary school when the Hindenberg flew over his school playground in NY right before it crashed. I remember him describing it with all the wonder of a boy of that age, "I swear, it blocked out the sun," he would say.

Cool to see this channel expanding into airships - not quite "oceanliners" but a fascinating part of transport history concurrent with the golden age of ocean liners, and likewise huge floating things. This is the second video on the subject, and it's strongly hinted more are coming - looking forward to that!

6:53 ".. and an asbestos-lined smoking room" - nice. Safety is our number one priority.

My grandfather (he died a few years ago at the age of 96) remembered watching the R101 go over his house as a boy.

Mike, the R-101 crashed five years before the DC-3s first flight. You should have either used the Ford Trimotor or Fokker F.VII as the airliner example.

Actually, i'm french and live at Beauvais and since i was kid, we learn here about the R101 crash, we even have a monument at Alonne, site of the crash. So i had to say this video was particulary touching for me. Great job!

Cue Iron Maiden’s Empire of the Clouds.

I had the good fortune to see the old Goodyear Blimp (before they switched over to the new Zeppelin model) fly low over my house one summer. Thing that impressed me was how it just hung there as pilot swung it into the wind and hovered it, got a wave from everyone and I waved back. At first I was wondering what the heck was going on as I heard the loud droning of the engines and props, then the big bulk of the envelope coming over the trees and blocking out the sun. The whole time I was grinning like a little kid, and at the back of my mind I was thinking "This thing is HUGE...but it's just a baby compared to the old airships. Probably would faint dead away on seeing one of those monsters."

I learned about this in history in secondary school 9 years ago. It's amazing anyone could survive something like this let alone six. May those poor souls lost rest in peace 😞

Several things about this video. One = The Douglas DC-3 didn't fly until 1935, so was not in service when the R101 went down. British passengers of that era flew in giant biplane airliners like those from Handley-Page and others. Two = I didn't hear it mentioned, but the R100 was designed, at least partly, by the famous scientist Barnes-Wallis, who went on to design the bouncing bombs used against the German dams in the Ruhr Valley in the Dam Busters raid of WWII. The R100 did fly to Canada and back safely. Side note: he also designed what is believed to be the first supersonic airliner/bomber which would have swing-wings to be able to fly slow enough to safely land or, swept back, it could fly at Mach 2. It was never built, as the British government was, at the time, interested in the huge Brabazon airliner, which was built, and flew, but not bought by any customers, even BOAC, which it was designed for. Three = you didn't mention that the fatal flight was vastly overloaded with luggage and personal effects that, "simply couldn't be left behind, what if it's needed in Pakistan?"

Sir Peter Masefields book “To Ride The Storm” is very good reading on R101. I visited the sheds near where the mast had been at cardington quite a few times with my dad in the 60’s.

My late mother saw R101 fly overhead on its last journey from her garden in Kent. She remembered it as moving very slowly.

If you get the chance, read Slide Rule by Nevil Shute, where a chunk of the book is about his time working for the Imperial Airship Program on the R100 and is particularly damning about the R101's construction, as the bureaucrats being the R101 project would have an idea and nobody in the management or engineering side of the project would put their foot down and say no, hence the finish ship was heavy, had very poor lift capacity, and some of its engineering was overly complicated - and there's a passage, post-crash, where somebody shows him an unused piece of the R101's cover that crumbles between his fingers like it's nothing

I started my engineering career at Cardington back in 1986. The hangers for both the R100 and R101 were still there in partial preservation. They still are to the best of my knowledge. At the time in the main RAF offices were artefacts from the R100 which was dismantled after the R101 disaster.

The Hindenburg’s sister ship was the Graf Zeppelin II. The original Graf Zeppelin had been built in 1928, and had a long & successful career traveling the world.