True Crime-Paranormal-Conspiracy Theories Stories Part V #Wattys2023

The Hindenburg Disaster Part II

Static electricity hypothesis

Hugo Eckener argued that the fire wasstarted by an electric spark which was caused by a buildup of staticelectricity on the airship. The spark ignited hydrogen on the outerskin.

Proponents of the static sparkhypothesis point out that the airship's skin was not constructed in away that allowed its charge to be distributed evenly throughout thecraft. The skin was separated from the duralumin frame bynon-conductive ramie cords which had been lightly covered in metal toimprove conductivity but not very effectively, allowing a largedifference in potential to form between the skin and the frame.

In order to make up for the delay ofmore than 12 hours in its transatlantic flight, the Hindenburg passedthrough a weather front of high humidity and high electrical charge.Although the mooring lines were not wet when they first hit theground and ignition took place four minutes after, Eckener theorisedthat they may have become wet in these four minutes. When the ropes,which were connected to the frame, became wet, they would havegrounded the frame but not the skin. This would have caused a suddenpotential difference between skin and frame (and the airship itselfwith the overlying air masses) and would have set off an electricaldischarge – a spark. Seeking the quickest way to ground, the sparkwould have jumped from the skin onto the metal framework, ignitingthe leaking hydrogen.

In his book LZ-129 Hindenburg (1964),Zeppelin historian Douglas Robinson commented that although ignitionof free hydrogen by static discharge had become a favored hypothesis,no such discharge was seen by any of the witnesses who testified atthe official investigation into the accident in 1937. He continues:

But within the past year, I havelocated an observer, Professor Mark Heald of Princeton, New Jersey,who undoubtedly saw St. Elmo's Fire flickering along the airship'sback a good minute before the fire broke out. Standing outside themain gate to the Naval Air Station, he watched, together with hiswife and son, as the Zeppelin approached the mast and dropped her bowlines. A minute thereafter, by Mr. Heald's estimation, he firstnoticed a dim "blue flame" flickering along the backbonegirder about one-quarter the length abaft the bow to the tail. Therewas time for him to remark to his wife, "Oh, heavens, the thingis afire," for her to reply, "Where?" and for him toanswer, "Up along the top ridge" – before there was a bigburst of flaming hydrogen from a point he estimated to be aboutone-third the ship's length from the stern.

Unlike other witnesses to the firewhose view of the port side of the ship had the light of the settingsun behind the ship, Professor Heald's view of the starboard side ofthe ship against a backdrop of the darkening eastern sky would havemade the dim blue light of a static discharge on the top of the shipmore easily visible.

Harold G. Dick was Goodyear Zeppelin'srepresentative with Luftschiffbau Zeppelin during the mid-1930s. Heflew on test flights of the Hindenburg and its sister ship, the GrafZeppelin II. He also flew on numerous flights in the original GrafZeppelin and ten round-trip crossings of the north and south Atlanticin the Hindenburg. In his book The Golden Age of the Great PassengerAirships Graf Zeppelin & Hindenburg, he observes:

There are two items not incommon knowledge. When the outer cover of the LZ 130 [the GrafZeppelin II] was to be applied, the lacing cord was prestretched andrun through dope as before but the dope for the LZ 130 containedgraphite to make it conductive. This would hardly have been necessaryif the static discharge hypothesis were mere cover-up. The use ofgraphite dope was not publicized and I doubt if its use was widelyknown at the Luftschiffbau Zeppelin.