The Hindenburg Disaster: The Fiery End of the Golden Age of Airships

In this episode of the Compendium, we explore the 1937 Hindenburg disaster. A Nazi airship that exploded midair, marking the end of the golden age of zeppelins. We uncover the mysterious details of the Hindenburg explosion and share some of the survivors harrowing experiences. Join us as we examine the impact of this infamous tragedy on aviation history.

We give you the Compendium, but if you want more, then check out these great resources:

1. "What happened to the Hindenburg?" Youtube, by Jared Owen
2. “The Hindenburg Disaster" Airships.net
3. "The Hidden Hindenburg”, podcast by Michael McCarthy
4.  "Hindenburg An Illustrated History" by Rick Archbold
5. “Herbet Morrison Original Footage”  - Youtube, History Remastered
6. “1936 NYC Hindenburg Flying Over Manhattan” - Youtube, My Footage

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Credits:

• Hosts: Kyle Risi & Adam Cox
• Intro and Outro Music: Alice in dark Wonderland by Aleksey Chistilin
• All the Latest Things Intro: Clowns by Giulio Fazio

Chapters

• 0:08 Sneak peak
• 0:47 Welcome to The Compendium
• 1:48 Todays topic introduction
• 5:59 All the latest things
• 14:49 Topic of the week
• 1:13:09 Listner Mail
• 1:16:26 Outro

Transcript

Kyle Risi: What's really interesting is that the process of landing the ship is actually extremely dangerous because while the ship is in the air, it builds up a lot of static electricity meaning that anyone on the ground that touches one of the mooring ropes before it has a chance to physically make contact with the ground, you would be electrocuted.

Kyle Risi: Really? Wow. 

Kyle Risi: welcome to the Compendium, an assembly of fascinating and intriguing things. We're a weekly variety podcast where each week I tell Adam Cox all about a topic I think he'll find both fascinating and intriguing. We dive into stories pulled from the darker corners of true crime, the annuls of your old unread history books, and the who's who of Extraordinary people.

Kyle Risi: We give you just enough information to stand your ground at any social gathering. I'm, of course, your ringmaster this week, Kyle Recy, 

Kyle Risi: And I'm your sideshowed freak for this episode, Adam Cox. Is this new? Who's changed the script here? 

Kyle Risi: Well, I thought we would kind of like feed more into the circus theme. After all, that's the theme of our show, right? Carnival, Victorian, whimsical, 1950s

Kyle Risi: 1950s and Victorian. Well, I mean, There's an overlap, right? We have artistic license. Shut up, you don't know me! Fine, I'm the freak for this week, yeah. On today's episode of The Compendium, we are diving into an assembly of fiery descents and infamous airships. Fiery descents? Ooh, well, burning, obviously, but I'm not quite sure what.

Kyle Risi: We are, of course, Adam, talking about the Hindenburg Disaster. One of the most historically significant aircraft crashes of all time. And certainly one of the most famous. So Adam, what do you know of the Hindenburg Disaster? That's the giant blimp, right? Well, I mean, technically, TECHNICALLY! It ain't a blimp.

Kyle Risi: It ain't a blimp. But yes, I can imagine what you're imagining in your head right now. And yes, it's the story of the Hindenburg. Yeah, so there's this footage, isn't there, which is pretty popular. I would say popular, as well as iconic. Fancy watching, um, The Hindenburg disaster footage. Uh, yes. I thought you'd never ask.

Kyle Risi: Coming to Netflix. Uh, no. What was my point? The point was, yeah, where it's, it catches fire in the sky and it crashes down. And isn't there a famous quote that came out from this particular disaster? Correct. Do you remember what that was? Oh, the humanity. Well remembered. I wasn't sure whether or not you would have a sense of this event really in history. Yeah, I know stuff 

Kyle Risi: So back in the 1930s a german company built the largest airship the world had ever seen and adam It was huge. It was almost the size of the Titanic and just like the Titanic it was designed to transport wealthy passengers back and forth across the Atlantic.

Kyle Risi: This airship was so renowned that nearly everyone in the western world at the time knew its name or had seen this incredible vessel eerily drifting into their city. It was a German feat of engineering that they were extremely proud of, so much so, That the Nazis used its presence over the cities of the world to show off their prowess.

Kyle Risi: But, in May of 1937, on a routine trip from Frankfurt to New Jersey, in front of hundreds of witnesses, including the press, this colossal airship suddenly burst into a fiery ball mid air before crashing down to Earth, in the most horrific way imaginable. 

Kyle Risi: The resulting footage of that event became an iconic moment in history. And as you said, you've heard the term Oh, the humanity. But also, you probably heard the term fell down like a Led Zeppelin.

Kyle Risi: Maybe not. But is that what led Zeppelin's named after? Led Zeppelin. Yeah, you've probably seen the iconic image of the fireball erupting from the Zeppelin on the album. Yeah, yeah. That's the Hindenburg disaster. It's all connected. I did not know that.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, yet, amidst the fiery chaos and the many pop culture references, it is also very easy to forget that this was a tragic event where lives were actually lost, and an event that marked the official end of the era of airships as a viable mode of transporting passengers across the Atlantic.

Kyle Risi: That was pretty much one of the last journeys ever made. Am I right in thinking Well, did it even take off? Because wasn't this supposed to be setting the scene for this type of air travel? No, Adam, this, a lot of people seem to think that this was its maiden voyage.

Kyle Risi: Oh, I thought so as well. But this was almost three decades since this type of vessel had been invented. This just however Marked the end of that era after 30 years. So on today's episode, we'll dive into the real story behind this infamous disaster.

Kyle Risi: I will tell you what this aircraft was, how it came to be, how the Nazis used this vessel as a propaganda tool to posture and intimidate the west. And, of course, how this colossal aircraft met its end in a fiery, blazing ball.

Kyle Risi: We'll explore how some passengers miraculously managed to walk away from this wreckage with barely even a scratch on them. And we'll try and answer the question, How did this disaster even happen in the first place? 

Kyle Risi: But of course, before we get started, It's time for all the latest things! 

Kyle Risi: Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, step right up and welcome to this week's episode of All The Latest Things, where we unveil the fascinating, the extraordinary, the downright loopy stories, strange facts, and intriguing tidbits from the past week.

Kyle Risi: So Adam, what have you got for us today? 

Kyle Risi: So this week, I discovered some facts. Some, some facts. Some facts. Some facts, you trans fats. I trans fats. Some facts. Some facts. About the lottery. So do you play the lottery? No, I don't. I always regret not playing the lottery, and that's why I've not won the lottery.

Kyle Risi: But if I had been playing the lottery, I wouldn't be here with you right now. Great, thanks. Um, so why would you play the lottery? To win money, right? Yeah, to win the bloody jackpot, obviously. 

Kyle Risi: Well, did you know that the lottery, one, is actually a very old tradition, it's been established for quite a long time.

Kyle Risi: How long is long? Well, the first, uh, in England this is, the first state lottery was held by Queen Elizabeth I. Wow, a long time ago then. Yeah, it's about 450, 460 years ago. But it actually predates her. Apparently one of the first recorded lotteries was in 1446. And even before that, the Roman Empire and China's Han Dynasty used money raised by a type of lottery 

Kyle Risi: to fund projects such as the great wall. Oh, really? Yeah. Wow. I guess it's like another way of collecting taxes, right? Oh, yeah, this is the thing. 

Kyle Risi: Elizabeth the first was faced with a dilemma. She needed some money to build some projects. I can't remember what. Some building probably. And she could either increase the taxes or she could create this lottery for people to play in.

Kyle Risi: And then the money from that would then go on to fund her projects and then give people an opportunity to win some money. I like how you think it was just like a building when it wasn't like a war or like, conquering, like, the Native Americans in in in America somewhere.

Kyle Risi: Well, you're saying that actually. She was looking to build some ships, so probably, you know Yeah, to go conquering. Yeah, so she decided to go with the lottery and this lottery was quite different to the ones that you find today. They were geared towards, wealthy people rather than those on low income salaries.

Kyle Risi: Because they didn't have any income or a salary, Adam! Yeah, okay, fair point. So it cost you about ten shillings a price of a ticket, which I have no idea what it is. In today's money, but I guess that's quite a lot for back then, and the pool was limited to around about 400, 000 tickets, and the lucky winner would just receive 5, 000 pounds in cash.

Kyle Risi: Wow. But also, some tapestries and some good linen cloth, and all participants would be granted immunity from arrest. What?! So long as the crime wasn't piracy, murder, felonies, or treason. I mean, those are all the good crimes, . But can you believe that you play in this and then you basically get like a, like a pardon?

Kyle Risi: Yeah, like a skip jail free card. Is it just one instance though? What if you like commit two crimes? One? I think just the one instance. So you, you get basically a slap on the wrist to go, yeah. Right. You can trade in your, I don't know. You'll get one free. What if you murder someone? No. What was one of the, what were the crimes again?

Kyle Risi: Piracy, murder, felonies, which, I feel, That covers all crimes. It feels quite broad, that one. You can commit any crime you want, as long as you do not commit a crime. Basically is what that's saying. I think, basically, you could steal some bread, but if you're rich, you're probably not going to steal any bread.

Kyle Risi: What if you steal some linen? Was one of them linen? No, you'd win some linen. Oh, you'd win, sake.

Kyle Risi: Uh, anyway, I forgot my point now. So, yeah, that's how the lottery began in the UK. 

Kyle Risi: So, Adam, I'm about to unleash my 10 year old boy Kyle. Oh god.

Kyle Risi: Because I am continually fascinated by the female body. So I discovered something today that blew my mind and I wonder how many other men out there were not aware of this. And I'm just going to say it now. If you're a man, listen to the show and you have a loving, cherished girlfriend waiting for you at home.

Kyle Risi: Then what I'm going to say might change the way that you see this feminine goddess that lightens up your life Who's sitting there right there on that sofa I'm about to change your view of her. Okay. I'm just gonna play the audio.

Kyle Risi: I'm scared

man: Is it true that when you fart sometimes, the fart goes up into your vagina? Yes. Yeah, I kinda like it when that happens. Tell me the truth! When you have a bush, it happens less. Stop. It feels nice? Yeah, it feels real nice. I don't know why it feels nice, but it feels real nice. 

man: Sometimes it happens and it'll just ride up. But sometimes it happens and it goes to a spot and it sits there and you're like wow Dude, if I move a certain way I can keep it there Like a fart bubble In your vagina And then do you can you fart if you get it out?

man: Does it make a sound? No, no, I just mostly just yeah. Yeah, right. Do you ever fart up into your dick? No Oh, i'll tell you when it happens and it feels really good. Okay 

man: When you're in the bathtub and you have a huge fart, okay, and you're sitting so that the air all the air comes up the front Yeah In the bath If you like have a big fart, yeah multiple bubbles and the pressure Goes all the way up.

man: So even though it's not stuck necessarily in your vagina lips It's still going in front of your clit. So it's like vibrating your vagina. Yes. Uh huh.

Kyle Risi: Do you know what? I've got this weird recollection that I might have known about this, but I didn't realise. How? Who told you this? Your sister? No, but I feel like I may have learnt about this before, but what I didn't know is the fact it feels good.

Kyle Risi: And then if you do it in a bathtub It's even better. Rubs against your clit, whatever that is. What the hell, man? Why are women keeping these secrets away from men? Well, maybe they just want to keep something to themselves. Mate, no. And I didn't believe this video when I saw it. So, this morning, I reached out to the Patreons.

Kyle Risi: Oh no. And I asked them to send a voice message. We got, in the short amount of time, we got two people responding. Okay, that's not bad. This is what Lizzie said.

Lizzie: Couldn't agree more. Uh, it does happen. I don't really give it that much thought, to be honest. But yeah, it does happen when I'm like, laying down, like she said, in the bathtub, or watching TV or something. Because obviously, it gets trapped between your cheeks, doesn't it? So it's got nowhere else to go. But it doesn't happen that much to me, to be honest.

Lizzie: Liar! Yeah, beans 

Kyle Risi: will do that. What? The more you eat, the more you do. Damn. But the way it was just so, like, nonchalant, like, oh yeah, it happens all the time. Yeah, why don't they share that with us? Who are women talking to about these things? I guess, I don't know, but if you don't know to ask, are they gonna tell?

Kyle Risi: I guess not, but I just like, boys talk about this stuff all the time together. All the time. Okay. Who are women talking to? They need to get these things off of their chest. So who was the other listener? Well, okay, so this listener clearly wanted to Stay anonymous. Stay anonymous. So I get the impression that she disguised her voice.

Kyle Risi: Okay. Because the name doesn't match up with the voice. Right. This is from one of our Patreons called Fenella Bella Anglo Saxon. Right, what kind of accent do you reckon she has with that kind of voice? Well it's gotta be a posh name, right? It's gotta be well posh!

Kyle Risi: Made in Chelsea. Nope, here she is. 

Lizzie: Well sometimes it can just creep out, but nothing like what they're saying. 

Kyle Risi: And that's all she left! So she's a Scouser! With a posh name like Vanilla Bella Anglo Saxon! Wow. Um, so yeah. Anyway, so she's kind of denying it. Like, it happens, but it's not quite how they're saying it.

Kyle Risi: Oh, okay. So I need to know, as he said, tell me the truth! I need to know! Guys, you need to send more messages in. There's a link in the show notes where you can send us a text message. We need to know what the facts are. Wow. I'm, I'm, I'm, I don't know what to say. We want to kind of like, freak out your boyfriends, you know? I just imagine a few guys now that are listening, just like, looking at their girlfriends, really like, with one eye half closed, going, What are you hiding from me?

Kyle Risi: Yeah, what else are you hiding? What's going on? What's in there? But yeah, that's all my latest things for this week. 

Kyle Risi: So Adam, many of us are likely familiar with the Hindenburg Disaster in some capacity, but very few of us, including myself, know much about what the Hindenburg was, how it went down on that day back in May 1937, and how many lives were actually lost in this disaster. And I think the best place to start is to first explain what the Hindenburg actually was.

Kyle Risi: Because you said earlier on was like a blimp, right? Yeah, a giant balloon with like some kind of gas. Exactly, now that's a great starting point for us, all right? So the best way to start is by imagining a giant blimp. And while it looked like a blimp, the Hindenburg was technically an airship colloquially known as the Zeppelin throughout the 1930s.

Kyle Risi: And what sets an airship apart from a blimp is that a blimp is it's just one big inflatable balloon which maintains its shape based on the pressure of the lifting gas that's inside. When you deflate it, it literally collapses down to a flat structure.

Kyle Risi: An airship, on the other hand, had a sturdy internal framework usually made out of lightweight aluminum or aluminium. So, you can think of this framework as the skeleton, even when there's no lifting gas in it, it would still resemble an airship. So also unlike a blimp, an airship is designed to carry passengers, a lot of crew, and also contain everything that passengers would want during a five day trip across the Atlantic.

Kyle Risi: This framework also allow for multiple rooms and deck cabins to be fitted on the inside of the airship, which wouldn't be possible in a blimp. In the inside? Exactly! Is it not? Like underneath it. It's in the framework So that little thing that you see sticking out.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, that's just the control deck where the captain sits Oh, so he needs to see Yeah, yes. It's not where the passengers are. And I call it an airship, but colloquially around the world, these were known as Zeppelins. And this was because a German owned company called Zeppelin had dominated the steerable airship industry for more than three decades up to this point.

Kyle Risi: Right. But basically the term Zeppelin had just become like the generic noun for airships when really it was just kind of like the brand name. It's kind of like how Americans call tissues Kleenexes, or how British people call vacuums Hoovers,

Kyle Risi: got used to branding. Exactly, or like how all thumbs are fingers but not all fingers are thumbs. That kind of thing. Um, yeah, a bit different, but okay. It's the same principle. So there were a lot of airships with different names at the time, but Zeppelins was kind of the brand name that everyone knew. So everyone just called them Zeppelins, essentially.

Kyle Risi: So the company was called Zeppelin because the person who invented the airship was a guy called Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin. His full name, however is Ferdinand Adolf Heinrich August Gruff Van Zeppelin. Yeah, I would've remembered that. What do you think of my German accent? Um You didn't even compliment that. Well, it wasn't So bad that it drew me out of what you were saying.

Kyle Risi: Good. Thank you. So when I was researching the history of airships, I discovered that people have been, like, experimenting with the concept of using balloons for air travel as early as the 1700s. So it's been around quite a long time. However, while balloons could travel like by riding air currents, they lack the ability for controlled directional flight, so if you want to go across the Atlantic, and this is pushing you like north, then, tough You're going to the Arctic , essentially. So you can't rely on these ships to get you where you want to go. Not really. Not unless it's for pleasure

Kyle Risi: really? Well, yeah, you might have like a little bit of steering capabilities by pulling the ropes, but if the wind is blowing heavily in one direction, you're not going to go against that. You need something to propel you forward. Yeah.

Kyle Risi: And what it needed was an engine, but engines weren't really available back then. And when they were finally introduced, of course, they were just too heavy and underpowered to be fitted to a balloon for transportation. 

Kyle Risi: But by the late 1800s and after retiring from the military, Ferdinand von Zeppelin, he became obsessed with the idea of using balloons for air travel after being inspired by how they were being used during the American Civil War. And as well as that the world had seen some major advancements in various technologies like engines and also the discovery of aluminum or aluminium.

Kyle Risi: So von Zeppelin began exploring the possibility of making airships viable for travel. So Ferdinand von Zeppelin's key innovation was the development of an airship design featuring an internal aluminum frame. And this framework provided the essential structural integrity enabling the airship to kind of withstand air pressures while still remaining lightweight enough to float, so additionally, it allowed for a more elongated aerodynamic design, which could then accommodate various internal compartments. Like, passenger cabins, cargo holds, and additional fuel storage, all on the inside of this balloon.

Kyle Risi: As we mentioned earlier on, the only external component was that control car, which served as the command center where the captain would steer and propel the ship forward. Everything was on the inside. So how many passengers could it carry?

Kyle Risi: Well, it depended on what facilities were built into this particular airship. This particular airship that von Zeppelin was building isn't the Hindenburg, right? So the early ones could carry very few, but eventually when we get to the Hindenburg, it could carry like over a hundred passengers. So quite a large number.

Kyle Risi: But yeah, that really surprised me because when you look at pictures of a Zeppelin, you see that little kind of small undercarriage sticking out from the structure. And I always just assumed that was the cabins. In actuality, that's just where the captain sits. I just thought because the airship was just so massive, their perspective just made that cabin look quite small because the top of the room was just so big the rest It was so big.

Kyle Risi: I didn't think they would travel for like days I thought that'd be just a short trip. So therefore you wouldn't need to stay overnight.

Kyle Risi: These would be routinely like 3. 5 day kind of journeys across the Atlantic they would even go as far as uh, Brazil. Wow, that's a long time in the air. Huge amount of time, but a few issues are going to arise when you have a long haul journey, which A lot of people potentially think puts this craft at high risk of exploding.

Kyle Risi: We did like a 15 hour airplane journey and I remember my calves like blew up. I mean they have obviously cabins and dining rooms so they're free to walk around so it's not the same. Not quite the same but still I reckon that must do some weird stuff to your body for three and a half days.

Kyle Risi: What, being up in the air? Yeah, I think so. The air pressure. Nah, it doesn't, I don't get the sense that it flies very high anyway. Oh yeah, okay, fair point, because otherwise you'd lose oxygen and everything. Exactly. So actually that brings us nicely to the fuel that I was using for propulsion and kind of these airships would use fuel like diesel or petrol just to kind of like propel it forward with those little propellers just like tick tick tick tick tick tick and would travel forward 

Kyle Risi: but for lift, unlike hot air balloons that used essentially hot air, zeppelins would be filled with like a lifting gas like helium. And the way that this would work is that on the inside of the framework there would be 16 smaller balloon nets and each one would be filled individually with helium and this would give them more control over the buoyancy of the ship.

Kyle Risi: this was also safer because it meant that if one of those balloons ever got damaged, Of course, there's 15 other of these smaller balloons on the inside that would help keep the ship up. So it's not going to be a massive catastrophe. It's not going to go crashing down if one of them bursts.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, I feel like foreshadowing. There's no foreshadowing here. Oh, okay. So eventually von Zeppelin's intervention was ready and in 1900 he launched his first airship. So the question is why airships over aeroplanes? Were aeroplanes even invented at this point? Ah, exactly.

Kyle Risi: So the Wright brothers would only invent their first aeroplane in 1903, so this is 1901. But also the technology was still very new even when they were finally invented, so they were a long way off catching up. But even around 1920s, there were still a lot of drawbacks that made aeroplanes just ineffective for mass transportation of people over long distances compared to zeppelins, right?

Kyle Risi: So for example, they could travel much further distances without requiring refueling compared to obviously early aeroplanes. But also early aeroplanes, they were limited by their inability to transport a lot of people in one go. Zeppelins also had huge cargo holding capabilities and therefore they were useful for commercial freighting as well.

Kyle Risi: So they could take you, all your shit, loads of other additional kind of cargo with them across to the United States for very fairly cheap because of course it's not using that much fuel. They just need a little bit of fuel to dart them forward and then they've got the lifting gas essentially.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, I didn't realize they were used for, industrial or commercial use, all that kind of carrying stuff. For a long time they certainly were, yeah.

Kyle Risi: Also, zeppelins didn't require long runways like planes do, right? They could literally take off and land vertically from almost anywhere. Anywhere. They were also more comfortable offering obviously a smoother ride compared to early airplanes which often suffered from turbulence. So it just made sense.

Kyle Risi: But again, additionally Zeppelins consumed less fuel. All you needed like I said earlier on was just a small amount of fuel for maneuvering since obviously all the heavy lifting was done by the gas unlike an airplane.

Kyle Risi: So when Zeppelin's invention was released to the world they were extremely useful for transporting people and cargo. But during the war, the Germans decided that they were going to start using them to drop bombs on cities. And at the time, Zeppelins, especially the German built ones, were known as baby killers.

Kyle Risi: Because for the first time, Zeppelins could move war out of the trenches and into suburban and urban areas where there were actually civilians living, and the Germans were just dropping bombs on them. But, the thing is though, the big downside to using a Zeppelin is that of course they're huge, and they're also really slow.

Kyle Risi: So you can see them coming from a mile off. Yes, hang on. Did they actually use, uh, these in World War I to drop bombs on Seraphilians? Because I didn't know that. Yeah, they did. Yeah. Ah, because I always thought it was just done in the trenches. I had no idea. It was the first time you could migrate from the trenches, really.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, and then that was my next point, to get away. I feel like you probably shoot that down quite easily. That's it. So they were kind of ineffective. They were scary, and they were looming, And they took everyone by surprise when they first started using them.

Kyle Risi: But then people were like, well, we'll just shoot it down, right? Yeah, we'll be here in 20 minutes. Yeah, but should we have a cup of tea? Get the guns.

Kyle Risi: So following the war, Zeppelins eventually went back to transporting goods and people. But by then, Germany wasn't the only country now making and using them. And this made Germany pretty pissed off because they felt that they had kind of like invented it.

Kyle Risi: They felt like they own the rights to their technology. So they were determined to now try and dominate the industry. So Germans decided that they were going to set out to build the biggest, most luxurious, most impressive airship they possibly could. 

Kyle Risi: So starting in the late 1920s, they drew up some plans. And in 1931, they started building. And it would take a total of 129 different designs before they settled on the one that they wanted to build. And eventually, in 1936, they unveiled to the world the world's biggest aircraft ever built. This was called the Luftzift Zeppelin Einhundert, Nein, und Zwanzig. That sounded like a whole sentence. It was, it was just, that was just one word. It's literally just one word.

Kyle Risi: So Luftschiff is basically German for airship. The 129 is obviously the 129th design of this ship and the Hindenburg was its name given after the president of Germany between 1925 and 1935. Ah, so okay and they just decided to call it Hindenburg for short.

Kyle Risi: That's right, yeah. Cool, good. So it was 245 meters long, so it was about 20 meters smaller than the Titanic. Which is crazy it's still massive. Yeah imagine seeing that in the sky that would look huge. Yeah so for scale just imagine the length of five olympic sized swimming pools laid end to end.

Kyle Risi: That's how big we're talking. People always say this and I have no idea how big an olympic swimming pool is. I guess if you ask a South African they know because there's pools everywhere right? Yeah but an olympic sized pool? Yeah. Okay. Every town would have A swimming pool for you to go swimming in and it's always an Olympic sized swimming pool.

Kyle Risi: Okay, so you're going to have to use a measurement that I'm going to know. Um, how many double decker buses? Oh my god, I don't know. Okay, how many football pitches? Um, probably five. Okay, fine.

Kyle Risi: So at its highest point it was 40 meters tall, the equipment of like 15 stories. So it was also the height of the Titanic as well, because if you remember I think the Titanic was like 11 stories, 12 stories. And on the inside, at the bottom of this framework, completely concealed from view, were all the compartments in the rooms which could accommodate passengers and 60 crew members, so well over 100 people.

Kyle Risi: And that's like bedrooms, right? Places to sleep and like bathrooms? I mean the cabins were small and there were shared bathrooms because of course it needed to be as light as possible. 

Adam Cox: The the image of the Zeppelin against what a Boeing 747 Is so your average plane that you'd go to Europe you can kind of get, get the sort of sense of it now because it's probably like three of them maybe not with the, like the bit at the very end, the wings and stuff like that. But if you think of the main main part of the aircraft, then yeah, probably three, maybe four that you could squeeze into this on top of each other.

Adam Cox: Just massive, isn't it? Yeah, that would have looked intimidating for sure. And this thing was, especially considering how low it would normally fly, and it would just drift silently over your city.

Adam Cox: But like I said, the passengers were all located across two decks They would have been deck A and deck B And passengers would actually board on the airship on the lower B deck Since of course this was lower to the ground Now B deck featured these angle windows Offering like panoramic views for passengers looking out From the deck on either side of the ship.

Adam Cox: And this is the deck where the bathrooms, the crew areas, and the kitchen and officers messes were located. This is also where the smoking room was. Hang, hang on. Smoking on a balloon filled with helium. Well, helium isn't actually flammable at all. Okay. But hold that thought. If you then head up the stairs from B deck, you'll come to A deck, and this is where most of the passengers spent most of their time. And, again, there were more windows along each side of the ship, and this deck housed pretty much the reading room and the writing rooms.

Adam Cox: There was a lounge area, completely kitted out with a grand piano, and this piano Was specifically made for the Hindenburg because at the best of times grand pianos weigh like a thousand pounds But this one was made from aluminum coming in at around about 356. Also on this deck were the passenger cabins and also the main dining room as well.

Adam Cox: So while the passenger quarters were all condensed together across these two decks, there's an entire corridor spanning that entire length filled dozens of other rooms.

Adam Cox: So what rooms or who are they for the crew or for the passengers? So that would be a collection of different things. There was a radio room and the mail room this all was at the front of the ship, so there were these two rooms there. Mail room? Yeah. Where are they getting posts from in the sky? It might be for like telegrams, just like the Titanic had the Marconi device in their mail room.

Adam Cox: Got you. I thought actual postal mail. I thought this doesn't feel, this feels unnecessary. Just drop this post off. Yeah. No, it was like the telegram and radio signaling room, etc. 

Adam Cox: So below this area where the mailroom was was also the control car and this is of course That cabin that you see sticking out below the kind of big giant silver blimpy thing Essentially the command center is where you'll find the rudder wheel which controlled the ship's left and right movements and of course the elevator wheel as well which controlled the pitch to keep the ship as level as possible for kind of passenger comfort. 

Adam Cox: Adjacent to this car were of course more officer quarters And if you continued along the keel corridor, you'd see numerous fuel and water tanks and even more crew quarters And also there were a number of cargo areas as well as an electrical room So this entire keel corridor led to all these different rooms across this entire ship.

Adam Cox: Yeah, and I guess things to do. So they've got a grand piano, a room and a smoking room, but probably not a lot to do up there, right? Reading room? No, DS, you'll be fine. Yeah, it just feels like entertainment back then. Probably, you really had to mind the fun.

Adam Cox: Yeah, I guess so. Being up there for three and a half days. I guess you could just have sex. Yeah, but even then, throughout the day. And actually, that probably wouldn't be that fun, because in the cabins, there were bunk beds. Fine, but I reckon people still did. They found a way, Kyle. 

Adam Cox: So the Kiel Corridor also had several shafts with ladders for the crew members to climb up higher and that enabled them to kind of be able to ventilate the gas from the 16 different balloon nets that were inside all that empty space inside the balloon. So remember when I said these cells were intended to be filled with helium?

Adam Cox: When it comes to choosing a gas for airships, you kind of have two options. Okay. It's hydrogen. And then there's helium. Ah yeah, hydrogen so it's supposed to be helium. That's right. So hydrogen had the advantage of being the lightest, cheapest, most readily available gas because essentially we can extract hydrogen from water.

Adam Cox: The downside was that it was extremely flammable. But I guess they were like doing a cost cutting exercise? No, not really. So helium is completely non flammable, but it was more expensive and you needed a lot more of it to kind of lift up the same weight.

Adam Cox: That wasn't the problem though. The problem was that America controlled 90 percent of the world's helium supply. It's essentially a by product of the oil and gas industry. On top of that, they were not selling it to anyone, especially the Germans. Because, of course, during World War I The Germans were dropping bombs on cities using airships filled with helium.

Adam Cox: So the Americans decided to amend their Helium Act in 1927, banning all exports of helium to Germany. So that meant that the Germans had no choice but to use Hydrogen, and 200, 000 cubic meters of super flammable gas contained within 16 flammable cotton fabric bags, all painted with very flammable metallic paint.

Kyle Risi: And, if you were paying attention earlier on, you will know that there was a smoking room on board. I was just coming back to this, because I was like, okay, so they thought about building the ship with helium. They found out that they couldn't fill it with helium because of America.

Kyle Risi: Fine. But that they still went ahead and go, well, should we still Put the smoking room in. Oh, well, we built it. Might as well. It's mental. Now, look, there's no defensive evidence that the smoking room had anything to do with the Hindenburg disaster. But, It is a major bout of negligence for you to switch to a highly flammable gas and not remove the smoking facilities on board.

Kyle Risi: Surely, when you strike up a match or a lighter, that's enough to set something alight. I know they're in their own balloons, but just, this feels stupid. We'll come on to the smoking room in a bit, because technically, even though you could smoke in there, it was the safest place on earth. on that ship. Ow, I'm intrigued.

Kyle Risi: But I want to explain to you first, why they chose to keep the smoking room in the first place. Because it turns out the reason was a commercial decision. As we know from the Titanic episode, transatlantic travel was fiercely competitive at the time, And there was this fear that passengers wouldn't have bought a ticket on board the Hindenburg if they had to go two, three, maybe even five days without a cigarette. They could have offset that by saying here have some like chewing tobacco and a bin. I guess so, I guess so, but they just decided that actually they can make this pretty safe. Okay.

Kyle Risi: So what they did was they only limited smoking to of course the smoking room and this room had a double door that was pressurized to prevent any hydrogen from being able to leak in. So technically this was the safest place on earth this ship. The room was also monitored by security at all times, ensuring that nobody left with a cigarette or a cigar, and the only lighters or matches on board were in that smoking room controlled by the bartenders.

Kyle Risi: Right, okay. We know for a fact that this smoking room had nothing to do with the disaster at all. But still huge bouts of negligence when you think about it. Yeah, and I feel like if they were negligent on that What else? What else were they negligent on? Well, we'll get to that. Okay So when the Hindenburg went into service one of its longest trips would be from Frankfurt to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, 

Kyle Risi: this would typically take 3. 5 days the most popular route was of course cross the Atlantic from Frankfurt to New Jersey and this took pretty much two and a half days and this was pioneering for its time because It was a lot faster than traveling by ship, which as we know on the Titanic episode that would take typically five days

Kyle Risi: They also didn't really need that much fuel either Like once the hydrogen was in these balloon nets, it could stay up in the air for as long as it needed They just needed enough engine power to propel it forward which they stored along that keel corridor On the bottom of the ship. 

Kyle Risi: So inflating the Hindenburg is straightforward First you would start by anchoring the ship down and then they'd fill each of the 16 balloons with hydrogen You And then once it's filled, they could then de anchor the ship and then it would just kind of rise off of the ground So it's pretty straightforward.

Kyle Risi: When they wanted to land the process was to release a bunch of gas into the atmosphere from the balloonette valves this would then cause the ship to sink down low enough for the crew to then to tether the ship to the mooring posts and then from there they'll be able to crank down the ropes just pulling it closer and closer to the ground and then like a little UFO, the little doors below B deck will then open up allowing passengers to then disembark and then embark.

Kyle Risi: Would allowing air out make the sound of a whoopee cushion? Depends. Depends, right? I was just thinking we're going down and all you can hear is I wonder if it like also buzzed like a whoopee cushion or a balloon You're a child You said you were going back to your tenure self So am I For all the latest things

Kyle Risi: So when the Hindeburg began its life as a commercial transatlantic passenger vessel in 1936 it quickly became a status symbol for the Nazi propaganda effort who realized that the ship could actually be used as a way to boast to the world how advanced German engineering and their industrial capabilities had become. And this was really successful because Was this ship Adam? It is just huge you saw the comparison shots between the boeing 747 And the size of the ship. It would just silently kind of appear over your city out of nowhere, casting these huge shadows onto street level and just based on its sheer size, it was just really intimidating to see.

Kyle Risi: But also, it adorned the Nazi insignia on its tail flaps as well. This was a Nazi vessel. And people were happy going on their front? Well, I mean they hadn't committed their atrocities at this point. The war hadn't yet started. Oh, okay, fine. But still, people, they were still doing some shady stuff.

Kyle Risi: Even when Germany wasn't in wartime, the Nazi insignia is pretty Nefarious. But didn't they get that, somewhere in China it's like a sign for peace, isn't it? I don't know if it's peace.

Kyle Risi: Yes, I think you're right. Yeah, they've taken something and bastardised it and made it rank. Because I remember when we went to Hong Kong, we went to the big Buddha there. They had that sign for us. Yeah, they had loads of swastikas everywhere. Well, if I wonder if they were facing the other way though, weren't they?

Kyle Risi: They were facing the other way, so it was mirrored. Mm. Mm. You know, and obviously they came up with this. But weren't we just on the wrong side of the fence? Because if you get onto the other side of the fence, of course there's going to be the mirror version of it. No, I think it was definitely not, yeah, it was definitely a different way around.

Kyle Risi: Yeah. Okay, interesting.

Kyle Risi: And the thing is though, Germany and the Nazis, they saw the ship as a symbol. Of the country's promise to restore Germany back to its former glory days after their humiliation that they received following World War I. Because of course the Treaty of Versailles was signed. And that just kind of pushed Germany into kind of the state of depression for decades essentially. Up until kind of like the 30s, That's the reason why Hitler came to power. Is because so many young Germans were just disillusioned by The fact that they were being oppressed by the rest of the world because of obviously what happened during world war one They were like we're sick of this How much longer do we need to keep paying and that allowed?

Kyle Risi: People like hitler to then rise to power because he promised to put an end to all of that Obviously it's way more complicated than that but hitler essentially was using this as that symbol to kind of show the world that germany's back bitches Yeah, but didn't really pay off. No, it didn't. It got pretty dark pretty quickly. Yeah in just a few more years

Kyle Risi: So by the time that the Hindenburg disaster happened It had already completed 63 successful trips back and forth across the atlantic And it had built up this reputation as being the safest fastest way to travel across the atlantic and on top of this It was also one of the most luxurious ways to make this journey as well. 

Kyle Risi: The internal passenger cabins were kitted out with like original artworks on the walls. There was a pianist on board to kind of entertain the guests each night. Passengers were also invited to put on their formal wear for dinner. And just experience kind of like luxury fine dining from like some of the world's best chefs at the time. So this really was luxurious. 

Kyle Risi: And it was because of this novelty and speed that the price to go on the Hindenburg would have been double the price of traveling on the Queen Mary. It was like the equivalent of 10, 000 today, but get there literally in half the time and you wouldn't have to deal with sea sickness at all.

Kyle Risi: So was it just doing trips from Germany if it was a German vessel or would it be going from, yeah, Germany to other places in the world?

Kyle Risi: It would stop at loads of other cities as well. In fact, they made a point of if they were traveling to, let's say, Germany. New Jersey, they would make a point of just traveling through as many cities as possible Even if they weren't stopping there. They just want to fly over them just to show off right? Okay 

Kyle Risi: So on the evening of May the 3rd 1937 the Hindenburg took off from Frankfurt with 97 people on board heading off on her first trip to North America of the 1937 season. It would be her 63rd flight overall. So this wasn't her maiden journey as a lot of people believed. And I guess 60 odd flights suggest that everything went fine and stuff like that?

Kyle Risi: Exactly. So I mean because she had done so many flights She'd built up this reputation of being one of the safest ways of getting across the Atlantic. And I guess this is over a year, because 60 flights, if they're about a week long or whatever it might be. That's right. Well, remember it's so, let's say a return journey is two flights.

Kyle Risi: So it'd be 30 trips across the Atlantic and back, essentially. So spectators and press, they were all there to see her take off, not only because of course the Hindenburg was a fairly impressive ship to look at, but also because over that winter she had received a bit of a makeover, and they'd added a whole bunch more cabins for more passengers, they'd given her kind of like a fresh lick of paint, they'd spruced up the interiors a bit, just kind of things like that, you know.

Kyle Risi: But despite this, the first flight of the season, it was only half full, just 36 passengers and 61 crew members. And the itinerary was that she was scheduled to land in New Jersey on May the 6th, early on in the morning. In total, the journey would take two and a half days. However, due to some really strong headwinds along the way, she was actually running 12 hours behind schedule, which is really annoying for the passengers on board. 

Kyle Risi: But also, it was really embarrassing for the captain, who was a guy called Max Pruss, because this was his first assignment. So of course he was feeling the pressure to kind of like, get there on time.

Kyle Risi: So I'm not foreshadowing anything by the way, but he was eager to get to New Jersey. Right, okay. So, I mean, to fall behind 12 hours, that's quite a lot. But then I'm guessing it can only do so much with its engines and steering.

Kyle Risi: It can't like, propel itself that far forward. I guess so, yeah. What is happening there then? I guess, is he, has it just been blown backwards? Like, if it's always in your face, it's going to be harder to, To get to the destination, so that's what's slowing it down. So there's probably nothing he could have done.

Kyle Risi: No. But 12 hours though. It's a long time, it's a long time. This doesn't feel like the most punctual way to travel. I don't know. 12 hours though, I mean, they get pretty pissy about it later on. Fine, and so he needs to prove himself on his first flight, and he's going to look at trying to make up some time, I'm guessing?

Kyle Risi: Yes, probably. I guess for him, it's just a little bit embarrassing because he wants to make a good impression on his first journey across the Atlantic, I guess.

Kyle Risi: Do you know what he could have done? What's that? He needed to offload some cargo, so I just reckon chuck out a couple of passengers. That should, I don't know, pick up a couple of hours. But which one do you pick though? Um, the most annoying.

Kyle Risi: So, late afternoon on May the 6th, 12 hours of course behind schedule, the Hindenburg into US airspace. And as it usually did, it would fly over as many big cities as it possibly could again to show off. They could have just gone straight to New Jersey. So they pull in over Boston. Then they have to turn south. They've got to go through Providence. They've got to go through, uh, New London, New Haven. Bridgeport, over Manhattan, and then down to Lakehurst in New Jersey, making sure to travel through all the major cities along the way.

Kyle Risi: I mean, I don't know where any of those places are apart from New York, but sure. Well, I mean, they're all up that coast. Okay. So you know where Manhattan is, right? Yes. Yeah, and you know that New Jersey is just after Manhattan. Uh huh. So they've gone all the way up the coast and they've come down. It's a long way.

Kyle Risi: Okay. It's a long way, Adam! Just go straight to New Jersey. They should have done. If it was like, Oh my God, I'm going to be late. Just go straight to New Jersey, bitch. No, we need to do this two hour flyby.

Kyle Risi: So, but yeah, like I said, the Germans were just keen on showing off their engineering prowess and their technologies. 

Kyle Risi: So of course, along the way cars would like stop in the streets. People would come outside of the houses just to take a look at this incredibly impressive, shiny silver ship the size of the Titanic, just creeping along in the sky. So as we said. As a propaganda tool, this was highly effective. People were impressed by it.

Kyle Risi: So eventually around 4pm they arrived at Lakehurst Airfield in New Jersey. But another delay caused by stormy and windy conditions meant that landing was going to be difficult. So the best thing for them to do was to just wait things out at this point. So the captain decided that he would take the ship on a bit of a scenic kind of flight up and down the Jersey shore while they just waited for kind of the conditions to clear a bit.

Kyle Risi: Of course, passengers are annoyed and frustrated. They expected to land early that morning and now it was approaching 7pm. The families and passengers who were there to pick up their loved ones, as well as reporters kind of looking to cover the first Hindenburg arrival of that year, had been waiting literally for hours . Yeah, and the reporters, they're like, well, this is not going to make the seven o'clock news.

Kyle Risi: But the ones who were getting even more annoyed were the returning passengers, especially the Brits, who wanted to get to the UK in time to catch the end of King George's Carnation.

Kyle Risi: And so they, more than anyone, were really, really impatient. But finally, around about 7pm, Captain Pruss decided that the weather had cleared up enough for So all crew were mobilized and ready to bring the ship in for landing. 

Kyle Risi: What's really interesting is that the process of landing the ship is actually extremely dangerous because while the ship is in the air, the ship builds up a lot of static electricity so it's the same as when you rub a balloon on your clothing and then you hold it up to your head, it kind of like makes your hair stand up on end. Uhhuh only. Imagine that on the scale of the Hindenburg, so it would build up all this static that would be so extremely dangerous meaning that anyone on the ground that touches one of the mooring ropes before it has a chance to physically make contact with the ground, you would be electrocuted.

Kyle Risi: Really? Wow. And I'm guessing this doesn't bode well with the, you know, dangerous gas in it. Exactly, man! People are stupid! 

Kyle Risi: So, to discharge the build up of static, you have to first release the valves of the 16 balloonets inside the ship to get some of the hydrogen out. And basically this would reduce the buoyancy of the ship enough to let the mooring ropes touch the ground. Once the ropes have grounded the ship, a bunch of crew can then go ahead and grab the ropes and then pull the ship down enough to attach to a winch, and then from there they'll be able to kind of like winch kind of the ship down. I thought they were going to be pulling them down which I thought like.

Kyle Risi: Well to a degree they're helping put it down. But then the other risks of course are that people trying to hoist the ship down via these ropes a gust of wind could kind of like push the ship back up into the air and very often these people would just be flung into the air and all of these things were things that people had to learn the very hard way.

Kyle Risi: Way, essentially. So you could be like clinging on to this rope for dear life being like, yeah Yeah, flung about. Yeah, oh, yeah, this is It's dangerous man. This is not cool. But anyway so far everything is going smoothly despite of course wind rapidly changing direction

Kyle Risi: now, the shifting wind was also causing the ship to start rocking up and down, which would obviously, of course, have been really uncomfortable for passengers on board. Also, the wind was making it difficult for the captain to keep the ship aligned with the mooring mast on the ground because it needed to come in for its landing facing a very specific direction. So in the command center, the captain was frantically adjusting the rudder wheel against the wind so it's thought that this constant adjustment by the captain likely placed extra strain on the cabling that was connecting the ship to the rudder controls. 

Kyle Risi: Right. Okay. So it's kind of quite tense and taut. Is that, could it snap perhaps? Yeah. Okay. Eventually the ship was exactly where it needed to be. Which was in the right direction, on an even keel, about 50 metres off the ground. 

Kyle Risi: Most of the passengers were watching out the windows and all of the returning passengers and family members were looking up at the ships. The camera crews were getting ready for the right moment to press record because of course they've been waiting around all day, so they didn't want to waste any more of their expensive film until the exact moment that the ship was coming in to land to press record.

Kyle Risi: All of the ground crew were taking their positions under the ship. Getting ready to pull it down. Then to everyone's sudden shock, the back of the Hindenburg ignited out of nowhere, igniting ballonets four and five towards the back of the ship. Those are those internal balloons filled with hydrogen gas.

Kyle Risi: This caused a beam of fire to force its way through the central aluminum frame called the Axel Corridor. That ran along the centre of the ship, firing a huge beam of right through the front of the ship, exploding out of the front. So imagine like a flamethrower with fire exploding through the barrel of the gun. That is essentially what happened. So within little seconds, the fire expanded, through to each ballonet one by one, engulfing the entire ship and turning it into a giant fireball.

Kyle Risi: in front of everyone that was watching from down below. And this entire thing was caught on audio and film by journalist Herbert Morris and his cameraman Charlie. 

Kyle Risi: God, I imagine this must been like one of the biggest disasters people would have ever seen to kind of see this and for it to be captured like that.

Kyle Risi: That's the thing. Here's the secret. This wasn't the first time this has happened. This was the only, the first time this had been caught on film. Oh really? So this, they knew that there was a risk that this could happen to the balloon if they put hydrogen in it? It happened a bunch of times before. This particular um, airship or other ones? Other airships. Right. Just like this had met the same fate. No way, I did not know that. Mm hmm.

Kyle Risi: But all of this happened so quickly and took everyone by such a surprise that Even in Herbert's voice, you can sense just how shocking all of this was. You can hear the horror in his voice. And this footage is where we get that famous line, Oh, the humanity. Do you want to see that footage? Yeah. Why not?

Kyle Risi: he is absolutely He's devastated. Like, we know the line, and people joke about it to a point, but when you hear his voice, he is in shock. His voice is trembling, and You see the flames it looks fine at one point, it's kind of, it's flying in and then maybe the camera cut and then all of a sudden it's turned on because it just ignites, you don't see that transition, but the flames are huge, he's saying four, five hundred feet in the air, and then just all of a sudden it just collapses, almost like It just burns like tinder, like a match.

Kyle Risi: Yeah. And then the flames just die down quite a bit. So it's just, it's over within a minute. Yeah. Isn't it just mental? Yeah.

Kyle Risi: And do you see what I mean when I say the shock in his voice and the emotion? One moment he's talking about the weather and the conditions and then suddenly he starts describing the flames and the carnage that starts ensuing around him. Yeah. And what I implored is that in spite of what is happening, he manages to still describe pretty well what is going on around him, in spite of the fact that obviously he's having some very human emotions.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, he's very emotional. When you think of like a news reporter now, I don't know if they would be quite as very rare. Would they still be able to continue on reporting in spite of the emotion? That's what's impressive. There is a myth, though, that he got fired for his supposedly unprofessional reporting.

Kyle Risi: On this which of course was just not true. I personally think that he just did an incredible job in that moment And adam it was extremely extremely important that he managed to maintain any kind of momentum Because if he had faulted in any way or had stopped reporting This wouldn't have been the iconic footage it is today, and without a doubt, more airships would have continued to be built and even more lives would have been lost, because as I said earlier on, this wasn't the first time this had happened, this was only the first time it had been caught on film.

Kyle Risi: And so therefore that I don't know it's obviously bad press for the company and people are not going to want to go on this airship again. Just Looking at this footage, it's any wonder how anyone could have possibly survived that.

Kyle Risi: A huge fireball just instantly engulfed the entire ship and the fact that it fell out the sky more than 50 meters. Initially, the assumption was that everyone on board had likely been burned to death in an instant. But once the wreckage hit the ground and the flames started to die down, dozens of people started emerging from the flames.

Kyle Risi: How the hell did they survive that? Not only did it crash land, because their quarters or wherever they were living was inside the balloon, which just, it's not as if that were outside the balloon where we thought they might have been, where you think, oh maybe that wouldn't have caught light. The whole thing caught alight, man.

Kyle Risi: I don't think there's anything that didn't. At first people just thought it was ground crew that had gotten caught up underneath the ship, but actually these were passengers. And incredibly, considering what you witnessed in that footage, two thirds of the 97 people on the Hindenburg actually survived.

Kyle Risi: In total, there were 37 fatalities, 13 passengers, 22 crew. One ground crew member who couldn't get obviously out of the way fast enough. Also, sadly, one German Shepherd called Ula, or ULA died as well in the Blaze. Was she on the ship or was she on the ground? She was on the ship.

Kyle Risi: Okay. And one of the theories as to why the ship exploded puts potential blame on that. Dog. Sure, blame it on the dog. Can't come back and say anything and even if it was still alive, couldn't deny it. No, she couldn't. So she was actually kenneled in the cargo area at the time, but we'll come on to her in a minute.

Kyle Risi: Okay. Out of the casualties, some luckily died, obviously within the wreckage, but many died later in hospital from like really severe burns or broken bones, crushed organs or from smoke inhalation. 

Kyle Risi: All of the survivors were interviewed by the press because, of course, this became one of the biggest stories in the world at the time.

Kyle Risi: And their accounts of how they managed to survive, Adam, are just harrowing. Don't tell me it was the smoking room that, like, helped save their lives. No, unfortunately. Pretty much when this happened, apart from a couple passengers, most people were, like, in the dining areas or in the drawing room where they can look out the windows.

Kyle Risi: Mhm.

Kyle Risi: So when the ship erupted in flames, a number of people jumped once they realized what was happening. So they jumped 50 meters out of the aircraft.

Kyle Risi: Essentially, willing to risk the fall rather than risking being engulfed by flames. Some of those who did jump obviously didn't survive the fall, but surprisingly many did. How, how, I'm trying to think, 50 meters. How is that like second, there's more than, how many stories is that? Let's just say like 20 stories high. How do people survive that?

Kyle Risi: Well, I'm going to tell you. Okay. So one of the men who decided to jump was a guy called Joseph Spa. Now he was a contortionist, an acrobat, and a comedian. His stage name was actually Bend Over

Kyle Risi: I mean, even in 1930s they had a good sense of humor and that's still funny. Then, so he was actually on his way home to the United States to start a new show at Radio City Musical. Now the first he noticed something was wrong was when he saw a bright orange glow reflecting off of the hangar where all the passengers and spectators were waiting for him.

Kyle Risi: Then all of a sudden he says the floor of the ship began tilting and near 45 degrees. This is where he then grabbed hold of the window frame and almost immediately he saw a wall of flames coming towards him. And then all of a sudden the ship started crashing down towards the ground.

Kyle Risi: So what he did is he managed pull himself up and out of the slanted windows where he was hanging for a few seconds And he thought that if he could hold on long enough until the ship came close enough to the ground, he could then jump from a safer distance.

Kyle Risi: And what he managed to do is time it to around about five meters at that point. And then what he did is he dropped down. He did an acrobatic tuck and roll. And then just kind of got up and walked away. Wow. And the only injury he sustained was to his ankle. But other than that, he was completely fine. He says that it was thanks to adrenaline, essentially, that he couldn't feel that he had sprained his ankle.

Kyle Risi: So he must have had like just a few seconds, maybe even less than that, to really react and know what to do. Yeah. To kind of go like, there is a giant bit of, well, ball of fire heading my way. Hold on. Gotta react. Yeah, and just think that quickly, so I'm just going to hold on to this and not just like launch yourself out or yeah, that's impressive.

Kyle Risi: Smart, right? And did, other people that survive follow suit with this? Because that's a big drop and that's why I feel like you just couldn't survive that. there's quite a variety of different ways that people decide to jump out and from what height they decide to let go. But it feels like the longer you waited or the later you jumped out, the more likely you were to survive, essentially.

Kyle Risi: Tragically, it was actually his dog, Ola, that was killed in the blaze because, of course, she was stuck in her kennel in the cargo, which is really sad. 

Kyle Risi: Another survival story is of an elderly woman in her 60s called Margaret. Now when the ship started to tilt she got knocked off of her feet and was dashed against the back of the compartment wall And she says that luckily she landed on an upholstered lounge but then immediately other people started piling on top of her because they were also flung to the back of kind of the compartment and Basically, she was left just dazed and confused When they all then clambered off of her, they all started making their way to the windows, but she just froze in place and she just didn't know what to do.

Kyle Risi: So eventually the ship leveled out and as it started to descend towards the ground, the flames started engulfing the entire compartment. So what she decided to do was grab her fur coat and throw it over her head and hope that it would be enough to protect her while she waited for The crash landing, but the ship landed so gently that she didn't actually know that they'd hit the ground.

Kyle Risi: It wasn't until one of the rescue team members grabbed her, pulled her onto her feet, that she realized that they were physically on the ground, and then the pear just rushed out of the craft. The only injury that she sustained was some just minor burns to her hands other than that, she was completely fine. She survived this huge fireball and a 50 meter crash and just walked away, and she's 60! That feels like there's hope for everyone when you hear that kind of story. 

Kyle Risi: But what kind of animal skin did she throw on her? Because I feel like I need that. That must have been very flame resistant. I'll tell you what it is. Here's my theory, right? A, why did it not come crashing down to the ground? I think it's because, of course, Hydrogen's burning, right? So, and it burnt very quickly, so I think it still has some loft in it while it's burning, so it's going to be a gentle descent down.

Kyle Risi: In terms of why does she survive that burning and not get more injured, I think it's because it's so quick, right? Because hydrogen burns real quick! Yeah, I guess that's the thing, because when you saw the footage, there's so much fire and then there's hardly any. In comparison. So did it engulf around her then?

Kyle Risi: But it just didn't, it wasn't there long enough to set her? I think so. I think that's got something to do with it. Wow. It's mental. 

Kyle Risi: Another story about a German family called the Donners. So it was a husband and wife and they were traveling with their three kids, 14 year old, a 10 year old and an eight year old.

Kyle Risi: When the ship started going down, the mum and the kids were at the windows and the dad was in their cabin kind of gathering some of their things together. The first sign that anything was wrong was when The mum saw people starting to jump out the windows and then she realised, of course, that shit, something's happening.

Kyle Risi: So, instinctively, she grabs two of her sons, eight and ten, And one by one she just shoves it out the window. I'm like, I think there's something else here by the way. There was something else at play there. Is this because I didn't clean my room? Well in the, they say when you're in an aeroplane, don't they, when, um, you need to fasten your own, uh, air mask first and then your child's.

Kyle Risi: I don't think you could throw your kid out the windows if you fastened your own seatbelt. In fact, the whole purpose of this is to get out of the aeroplane. Well, yeah, she was strapping guys, you're in for a burning time. Yeah, she's just like thinking of them first. And as she should do, I would, I would like, screw me.

Kyle Risi: I want to help like my loved one. Yeah, and someone calls out to her, uh, this plane isn't crashing. Oh, sorry. Oops. Sorry, Billy. See you at home. It's like, oh, someone kill me. Billy's just laying on the floor, all broken boned. I'm glad I've done it again. Anyway, this is a real serious story, Adam.

Kyle Risi: So she chucked her two sons out the window, and then she was just screaming at her 14 year old daughter to do the same. But. The girl just freaked out and she again just froze in place. Now, her mother tried to lift her up but she just couldn't manage it, she was just too big. So she decides to jump out herself, the mum does, right? Holding onto the window to show her daughter, like, It's safe, come on, follow me. It's safer than staying inside, yeah. Exactly. So sadly the daughter, she doesn't jump in time.

Kyle Risi: Eventually rescuers, they do pull her out of the wreckage alive. But she is one of those passengers that ends up dying in hospital. Oh. And tragically her father doesn't make it either. The mum, obviously she had to live with the memory of having to jump out of that craft without a daughter for the rest of her life.

Kyle Risi: But what's incredible is that eight year old son of hers that she chucked out of the bloody window, um, he ends up living and being one of the last survivors of the crash. He died in the year 2020. Wow. Mental? Yeah. So of course this event just became one of the biggest stories in the world and everyone wanted to know how it was even possible for a ship like this to just burst into flames.

Kyle Risi: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The truth is that even after 80 years, we are still not sure. Of course, the most obvious thing to blame was that smoking room, but it turns out that that was actually the safest, most fireproof place on that ship. And according to those who studied the footage, it's clear that the fire started towards the back of the ship, nowhere near that smoking room anyway.

Kyle Risi: So some popular theories include terrorism actually. So this stems from mounting anti nazi sentiments at the time and people believed that someone had sabotaged the ship possibly planting a bomb on board or firing a shot at it from the ground and this theory was hugely popular you amongst Germans and Nazis themselves, including obviously Captain Max Pruss.

Kyle Risi: Now for the Germans, this made sense then because of course the world had been suppressing Germany since the end of World War I, right? For Captain Max Pruss, the terrorism theory, deflected any wrongdoing on his part that he could have potentially done something to cause a fire.

Kyle Risi: And so for a while, they actually investigated Bendover in connection with this terrorism theory because he was the only passenger allowed in the luggage haul to feed his dog. So there was speculation that, as a contortionist, he could have squeezed between the gas bags to set a time bomb.

Kyle Risi: But the thing is though, the investigation, they sifted through literally every single ounce of the ash from the wreckage and they found no evidence of any tampering or any explosives whatsoever. So this theory was just dismissed to, of course, the dismay of the Nazis.

Kyle Risi: So, we're saying it's not the dog. It's not the dog. she's not in cahoots with Bendover. Or with the Nazis, no. Or against the Nazis. Well, she was a German Shepherd, this dog. Ah. Hitler famously had a German shepherd and maybe this German shepherd knows something. So they were like, let's plant a bomb to get back at the Nazis. I don't know, we've digressed.

Kyle Risi: So the next theory was that it was, of course, the captain's fault. So following the initial investigation, they interviewed all the surviving crew members, passengers, and they reviewed, of course, that iconic footage. And many agreed that Max Prosser's decision to try and land the ship in, of course, less than ideal conditions could have caused one of the wires within the rudder turning mechanism to snap therefore puncturing one of the gas bags therefore causing a spark could have sent the ship up into flames.

Kyle Risi: And of course this theory was backed by the Zeppelin company themselves only because They wanted to deflect any blame from the ship's design. Yeah, so everyone's just blaming the driver or pilot I don't know. Anyway, this guy could have been his fault.

Kyle Risi: Yeah. So actually evidence showed that there was excessive wear and tear on the gas bags that were kind of rubbing up and down against each other. And they found that during maintenance checks of the ship. Instead of bloody replacing the worn out gas bags, they just taped over them. 

Kyle Risi: What we're saying is maybe it was the pilot, captain, but also they probably should have done a better job of maintenance. Exactly. So it's also completely plausible that the wear and tear on those bags and the build up of static electricity caused the spark that of course ignited the airship into a ball of fire and they think this is likely because when the Hindenburg was coming into land The footage shows that the back of the ship was already slightly slanted, indicating a possible leak between ballonets four and five. Yeah, that makes sense. 

Kyle Risi: So the decision to tape the bags rather than replace them was because the Zeppelin company hadn't yet produced any profit yet, and they didn't want to invest any extra money that would set profitability back, like, several months.

Kyle Risi: However, the company's effort to lay blame on the captain was after this disaster, nobody wanted airship again anyway! Especially after seeing the Hindenburg footage circulating around the world. Yeah. The reality is, Adam, is that by 1937 many countries had already stopped using airships due to a series of very similar incidents concluding that the use of hydrogen was just far too dangerous.

Kyle Risi: So in 1917 The British Rigid Airship Empress caught, fired and crashed in England killing 21 people on board. another British airship titled G1 broke apart over the North Sea killing all 13 crew members.

Kyle Risi: In 1921, another British airship, R38, broke up in midair, crashed in Hull resulting in 44 casualties. 1922, the US Army semi rigid airship Roma caught fire, crashed in Virginia killing 34 out of the 45 passengers on board. And it was this incident that finally prompted the US to go, we're out. No more airships.

Kyle Risi: Then in 1923, a French rigid airship, called Dixmude. Dixmude? Weird name. Dixmude. Dixmude. I can keep saying it. It's too close to smooth. That one exploded in mid air over the Mediterranean Sea after a suspected lightning strike and that killed all 52 people on board. And then 1930, another British rigid airship, the R101, crashed in France during its maiden overseas voyage and that resulted in 48. fatalities amongst crew and passengers and it was this disaster that effectively ended the British rigid airship program. 

Kyle Risi: I was going to just say they feel like they're a little bit late to the party. Considering a lot of these crashes are British airships, the Americans were like, no, let's get out of this.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, we had one, we're out. For once, the Americans aren't putting profits, ahead of passenger safety. Yeah, maybe. The 1930s was a good time for America. Yeah, but not the British. No. Bit dumb. So the thing is though, despite these incidents, Germany had maintained almost a perfect safety record up until 1937.

Kyle Risi: They had no incidents. So, no passengers had ever been killed on a German ship. The Hindenburg Disaster, however, marked the global end to the airship era, but only because this incident was the most publicly documented incident thanks to that footage. If it wasn't for Herbert Morris And his commentary, airships might still continue posing dangers to people for a much longer period of time, and that is the story of the Hindenburg disaster, a tragic event that not only cost lives, but also marked the abrupt end of the airship era globally. Yeah, wow. What a, key moment in history. It kind of reminds me of, um, a similar thing happened, maybe not to the same extent, but with the Concorde.

Kyle Risi: I know that's probably because it was, like, costly to run and everything like that. But then there was that crash, I think, I think it was in France. Yeah, that was almost like a no nonsense thing, right? It was almost like there was one crash, and then they were like, No, thanks. Yeah, and that basically put the end to the, of Concord, because I think, one, it was expensive, so maybe people are questioning it, and then this crash made them go, that's it.

Kyle Risi: But yeah, I think the Hindenburg disaster just reminds us, actually, and I can't believe I'm saying this, because I've been so very anti media.

Kyle Risi: But this reminds us of the power of the media, because there lots of other incidents similar, if not worse, than what happened with the Hindenburg. Yet because they weren't reported on widely, people kept losing their lives on these vessels. until Herbert Morris and Charlie captured that iconic footage that these flying bombs finally were retired.

Kyle Risi: So, I'm gonna say it here, the media does have some positive effects. Well, I think there are a lot of journalists that are trying to do good and get news out there. But then you've got the hungry tabloids that need to sell space. Yeah, maybe it's the tabloids. There's a clear distinction there. It's the tabloids, right?

Kyle Risi: Well, maybe. I don't know. Then you've got Piers Morgan. I mean, what's he doing? Uh. He's a troll. Though I did enjoy his uh, interview with Fiona Harvey. The one from Baby Reindeer. Oh yeah. That was interesting to watch. That was uncomfortable to watch. It was very uncomfortable, but still interesting.

Kyle Risi: What's that noise, Kyle? Adam, it's time for Listen to Mail. Oh, that's back. Yes! We have some Patreons that need to be thanked. Okay, that's fine. So a couple weeks ago, you may have noticed a new link in the show notes.

Kyle Risi: And this week we have a great letter from a lovely lady in Norfolk. Adam, do you want to give this a read? Ah, this one comes from Phoebe. She says, Hey guys, I just listened to the latest episode on the emu wars, which was like weeks ago. That was ages ago.

Kyle Risi: What have you been doing? Where have you been? And she says, Kyle, your talk about the lies we were told as kids made me laugh so much because it's so true. You wondered what lies would tell our own children, and I've been thinking about this. The only lie we seem to tell nowadays is about Santa Claus.

Kyle Risi: Which is true, actually, isn't a lie? Is it a nefarious lie? I think, I don't know, it's got good intentions, right? But anyway, Phoebe says, Some parents don't feel comfortable lying about a man sneaking into the house at night, even though we were all told this lie. So some believe in being more truthful with their children.

Kyle Risi: For us, Santa and the Easter Bunny are the only myths we maintain. And the Tooth Fairy, I'd like to add to that one, but no one really buys that. Mummy, there's a man in, in my bedroom. Uh, it's a paedophile. It's like Does he have presents? There's truth and there's too truthful. Um, she says, many in our generation choose not to perpetuate those stories unless it's part of religious beliefs.

Kyle Risi: Personally, I love the magic it brings and wasn't upset when I found out the truth. On a side note, I often tell my son it's okay when he gets upset, even though in that moment he's clearly not okay. Is it a lie being invalidating how our kids are feeling in the moment?

Kyle Risi: Food for thought, she says. As she ends her letter.

Kyle Risi: She also says, uh, the lie you mentioned about eating crusts will make your hair curly. Oh yeah, curly chest hairs. Yeah, uh, she only heard that one in high school and it was strange because everyone knew it. And one day this hot guy came up to her and said, Oh, you're eating crusts, you'll get curly hair.

Kyle Risi: And she was like, what is he talking about? Anyway, I love the show. Thanks for making my drive to work so much more educational. Oh, thanks Phoebe. 

Kyle Risi: Oh, thanks Phoebe. So yeah, I'd also like to welcome some of our Patreons. So it's been a week since we officially launched our Patreon and we have a few freaks that we'd like to welcome to the circus.

Kyle Risi: So I'm really excited because you guys have just been so lovely and so supportive and it just means the world to us. It's really validating to hear from you guys. So I'd like to welcome gerard Skelly, Kayla Delk, Alex Haddock, Stephen Arnold, Fenella Bella Anglo Saxon, and of course Holly. And I must say actually, Holly, I think Holly might have a little crush on you. Because there's been more than one occasion where Holly has come rushing to your defense, Adam.

Kyle Risi: And she's been a little bit too complimentary. She has got my back when you put me down, Kyle. So I, I thank you, Holly. Too much. It's too much for my liking. 

Kyle Risi: So Holly, if you want to go, I'm ready. I'm ready, girl. Let's do this. Yeah, thanks guys for joining the Patreon. And we hope to, oh, catch up with you soon.

Kyle Risi: Yeah, for sure. Should we run the outro? Let's do it.

Kyle Risi: And that's another episode of the Compendium Podcast. If you enjoyed today's episode, please follow on your favorite podcasting app. It really helps us. Next week's episode is available seven days early on our free access Patreon. For more content, subscribe to our Certified Freaks tier for access to our entire backlog of unreleased episodes, exclusive posts and sneak peeks.

Kyle Risi: We'd love you to come and join and have a chat. Transcribed We release new episodes every Tuesday and until then remember what goes up in flames Always comes falling down. 

Kyle Risi: See you next time. 

Kyle Risi: Bye