February 12, 1935 – The US Navy’s rigid airship USS Macon(ZRS-5) crashes and is lost off the California coast at Big Sur. Macon was the second ship of her class after the USS Akron (ZRS-4), the largest helium-filled airships of the time. Both served as "flying aircraft carriers" and scouts. In service for less than two years, two Maconcrew died while 81 were saved from the crash.
These airships carried five aircraft in an internal hanger, either single-seat Curtiss F9C Sparrowhawk biplanes for scouting or two-seat Fleet N2Y-1 for training. Planes could be released and recaptured with the airship in flight. The airships displaced a volume of 7,401,260 cu ft in a length of 785 ft with a hull diameter of 133 ft. Propulsion was from eight Maybach VL-2 12-cyl water-cooled gasoline fuel-injected 2,029 cubic-inch 60° V-12 engines, four on each side mounted inside the airship. They produced 560 horsepower at 1,600 rpm each. Mounted on pods outside airship, eight three-bladed adjustable-pitch metal propellers were rotatable and reversible providing both lift and thrust for station keeping. Speed was 55 knots (cruising), 75 knots (maximum) with a range of 940 nmi at 10 knots. Crew complement was normally 60 officers and men.
The USS Macon was built at the Goodyear Airdock in Springfield Township, Ohio by the Goodyear-Zeppelin Corporation. Because this was by far the biggest airship ever to be built in America, a team of experienced German airship engineers—led by Chief Designer Karl Arnstein—instructed and supported the design and construction of both the U.S. Navy airships Akron and Macon.
The Macon had a structured duraluminum hull with three interior keels. The airship was kept aloft by 12 helium-filled gas cells made from gelatin-latex fabric. The rows of slots in the hull above each engine were part of a system to condense out the water vapor from the engine exhaust gases for use as buoyancy compensation ballast to compensate for the loss of weight as fuel was consumed.
The Macon was christened on 11 March 1933. The airship was named after the city of Macon, Georgia (the largest city in the Congressional district of Carl Vinson, then the chairman of the House of Representative's Committee on Naval Affairs).
The airship first flew on 21 April, aloft over northern Ohio for nearly 13 hours with 105 aboard This flight was sixteen days after the Akron was lost at sea off the coast of New Jersey in a severe storm. With 73 dead, many of them drowned, and only three survivors, the Akroncrash is the deadliest airship accident. (On May 6, 1937, when the German LZ 129 Hindenburg caught fire while landing at Lakehurst, New Jersey, there were thirty-five flight crew killed, one on the ground killed, and 62 survivors.)
Via FB Group U.S. Naval History Buffs
Sources: Naval History and Heritage Command, Wikipedia, and Navsource.IMAGES:
1. Photo-enhanced version of USS Macon (ZRS-5) Flying over New York Harbor, circa Summer 1933. The southern end of Manhattan Island is visible in the lower left-center. - NAVAL HISTORICAL CENTER Photo #: NH 43901
2. USS Macon (ZRS-5) Under construction in the Goodyear-Zeppelin Corporation hangar at Akron, Ohio (1932).
3. A U.S. Navy consolidated N2Y-1 in the hangar of the airship USS Macon (ZRS-5) in 1933/34. The USN equipped six N2Y-1s with hooks to train pilots for the Curtiss F9C Sparrowhawk fighters and also used the N2Y-1 as liaison planes between the ground and the airship. (circa 1933-1934)
4. The F9C-2 (BuNo.9057) Sparrowhawk fighter, piloted by Lieutenant D. Ward Harrigan, USN. Shown hanging from the trapeze of the airship USS Macon. Navy photo ID: 80-G-441979
5. USS Macon (ZRS-5) View in the airship's auxiliary control station, located in the lower vertical fin, circa 1933-1935.- U.S. Naval Historical Center
6. While on a long-duration flight over the Pacific, the Macon was able to locate, identify, and track the cruiser Houston (CA-30), which was carrying President Roosevelt on a trip from Hawaii to Washington.
7. USS Macon (ZRS-5) at North Circle NAS Sunnyvale, Mt View, CA. This U.S. Navy Zeppelin was built in the United States by the Goodyear-Zeppelin company in 1933. It is shown here at the airfield later named Moffett Field in Santa Clara County, California.
8. View of a port wing of one of four Curtiss Sparrowhawk F9C-2 biplanes found at the USS Macon site. The pre-1941 pattern U.S. roundel emblem still faintly visible on the sunken wreckage of a Macon airplane.
