So often tried never successful. What si the difference now?
Still wind is the enemy and the airship need to be huge to deliver relevant amount of cargo.
Also super slow normally...
Still wind is the enemy and the airship need to be huge to deliver relevant amount of cargo.
Also super slow normally...
Wind patterns are actually well understood: hot-hair ballons already move around simply by changing their altitude and going around reasonably freely. I don’t know if those could handle the jet stream, but that would make NY-London a lot faster.
Agree with you on how slow previous prototypes have been: I was part of a project that tried to use them for urban transport, and it was not going nearly that fast… 65 knots is the speed of cars on a highway (at least the legal limit).
It's fortunate the Wright Brothers didn't listen when the guy at the Kitty Hawk bar said that.
Also, the question is not whether a big airship can be made to fly, because there’s little doubt they can. The question is whether a business model exists that can pay for their construction and operation.