The engineers who built it, Upson and Preston, made their first airship flight in delivering the ship to Akron, using theoretical principles applied in the international balloon race the year before, to make up for their lack of practical experience.
Those first ships were small, slow, lacked range, uncovered many shortcomings. Flight training was done under adverse circumstances. Men had to teach themselves to fly airships, then teach others to fly them.
The pilots were chiefly engineering students from the colleges, with a sprinkling of Navy officers. They had to take their advanced training abroad at British and French bases, because there were no facilities here, and in fact did most of their flying abroad. By the end of the war American pilots were manning three British airship bases and had taken over practically all the French operations, including the large base at Paimboeuf, across the Loire from St. Nazaire, on the French coast.
So the war was well along before American bases were set up and manned. These were at Chatham, Mass., at Montauk and Rockaway, N. Y., at Cape May, Norfolk and Key West. Like the airplane patrols the blimps saw little action, though they had an advantage in that they could stay out all day, while the short range planes of 1917-18 had to come back every few hours to refuel.
A patrol airship at Chatham, Mass. missed its chance in that it was adrift at sea with engine trouble when the German U-156 slipped into the harbor at nearby Orleans and wiped out some fishing boats—though it might have done no better than the first plane which reached the scene, whose few bombs did not explode.
The blimp patrols, however, uncovered one other type of activity. More than once they spotted suspicious looking craft emerging under cover of fog, from remote coves and inlets along the Long Island coast, fishing boats and barges with improvised power plant and curious looking paraphernalia on deck. Keeping the stranger in sight the blimp summoned armored craft from shore which sent boarding crews on, found mines destined for the New York steamship lanes.
A more important result of the blimp operations was the improvements in design which were found, particularly in the “C” type ship, brought out in 1918, of which 20 were built. They had much better performance in range, power, could make 60 miles speed, were faster than any airships except the Zeppelins. Navy officers and crews came to have high respect for them.
Here’s the gallant C-5, which with a bit of luck would have been the first aircraft to cross the Atlantic. (U. S. Navy photo)
