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Next he adjusted the telephone to recall the crewman reporting the spill.
“How much have we lost?” he asked.
“Fifteen hundred gallons, sir,” the man answered.
“Is the fuel still flowing?” Rosendahl asked.
“No, sir,” the crewman said. “It was a crack alongside a weld. The level in the tank is now level with or slightly below the crack. If the ship remains stable, we should not have any further flow.”
“I’ll send a mechanic,” Rosendahl said, “to see if we can temporarily patch the tank.”
“Yes, sir,” the seaman said.
Rosendahl turned to Dresel. “We need to vent the fumes,” he said. “Will you take charge of that?”
“Yes, sir,” Dresel said.
Akron limped along on engine seven as the fuel was vented.
An hour later, things were looking up. The thick fumes in the control car were receding, and Dresel was reporting that most of the liquid gasoline had flowed out of the hull between spaces in the covering. It seemed the worst had passed.
“Sir,” the radio operator reported by telephone, “San Antonio is reporting thunderstorms.”
Rosendahl stared ahead. The ominous black clouds were still miles ahead, and right now the only ones near Akron were a few white puffy clouds that looked like cotton balls. Just then the hair on Rosendahl’s arms stood out.
“Wow,” he said seconds later, as a huge bolt streaked from one of the i
Dresel returned to the control car. “The fuel is vented as best we can,” he said. “The rest of the fumes will just need to work themselves out.”
“We’ve got a line of heavy weather ahead,” Rosendahl said. “I’m ordering a course change to the north.”
That night and all of the following day, Akron fought the storm.
Wednesday, May 11, Akron reached San Diego.
Mooring a blimp is not unlike mooring an aircraft carrier — there is a lot that can go wrong. Akron’s planes flew down through the cloud cover and landed safely; now it was the huge blimp’s turn to try. Camp Kearney outside San Diego sat on a plateau of scrub brush and dust. Prone to gusts of wind and changing temperatures, she was far from the ideal spot for a blimp base. Still, Rosendahl had little choice—Akron was low on fuel.
Fog and clouds made visibility difficult as Rosendahl ordered Akron to descend. They were less than 1,000 feet above the ground before the view cleared. Rosendahl caught sight of the primary winch. The time was 11:42 A.M.
“Get a line down to that winch,” he shouted over the telephone.
And then it all went wrong.
A freak of nature caused the temperature suddenly to drop ten degrees, causing a temporary loss of buoyancy. Rosendahl ordered the engines turned downward, but that stirred up the dust, making visibility difficult. Akron barely moved.
“Full open on the helium valves,” Rosendahl ordered.
But Akron’s angle kept growing.
Then several of the water ballast bags tipped over, pouring some three thousand gallons of water on those below. Nothing was going right.
“That’s it,” Rosendahl ordered. “I want free flight.”
Orders were given to cut the cable holding Akron to the winch.
Two men were assigned to the forward cable, but one had abandoned ship by sliding down the cable to ground when the ship had taken her last lurch upward. The single man left was unable to cut the 7/8-inch steel cable. He dropped the bolt cutters to a group on the ground, asking them to cut the cable from below.
At numerous points along Akron’s hull, sailors from Camp Kearney were holding lines that would later be attached to anchors. Only their weight held them to the ground. Once the cable was cut, Akron began rising.
Apprentice seaman “Bud” Cowart suddenly found himself dangling from a line some twenty feet in the air. Three other seamen had dropped safely to the ground, while Cowart and two more hung on for dear life. As Cowart watched, one of the men on the rope let go. The man plummeted downward. Akron was at a height of one hundred feet and continuing the ascent.
Cowart stared toward the ground in horror.
While the body plummeted down, the other remaining sailor was hanging on by one hand. Just before the first man struck the ground, the second man dropped. Akron was at a height of two hundred feet. A sailor dropped through the air with his arms windmilling. Cowart watched as the man slammed into the earth, bounced a few feet in the air, then came to rest facedown.
Neither man would survive the fall.
Cowart was now alone, and the giant airship continued to climb. Finding toggles on the manila rope, Cowart managed to fashion a crude boatswain’s seat as Akron hovered at fifteen hundred feet of elevation. On board the airship, the situation was coming back under control.
“Men,” Captain Rosendahl said over the telephone, “the landing was aborted and now we have a situation on our hands. One of the landing crew is dangling from our mooring line, and we need to get him aboard. Proceed to that objective at a safe pace.”
Hanging the receiver back in the cradle, Rosendahl turned to Dresel.
“You just witnessed the worst that can happen,” he said. “Remember it, and don’t let it happen to you.”
“Yes, sir,” Dresel said.
“Now take over the helm. I’m going back to see how Lieutenant Mayer is doing on bringing aboard that sailor.”
Cowart shouted up at the Akron. “When are you going to haul me aboard?”
“It may take an hour or better,” Mayer shouted back, “so secure yourself to ride it out.”
“What’s the deal?” Rosendahl asked.
“We need to get a line to him,” Mayer said, “then try to winch him aboard.”
It would be two long hours before Cowart was finally yanked aboard.
Seven hours after the first attempt, Akron finally moored at Camp Kearney.
Akron traveled north from San Diego to San Pedro. For the next few weeks, the airship would take part in training exercises off the West Coast of the United States. On June 6, the weather was right for the trip east to Lakehurst. From San Pedro to Ba
Akron had been away thirty-eight days and had traveled more than seventeen thousand miles.
As the new year dawned, Akron received her third captain in nineteen months as Commander Frank McCord assumed leadership of the blimp. McCord wasted no time on the ground — two hours after assuming control, Akron set off for a cruise to Miami.
Throughout January and February, McCord kept up a full flight schedule.
On March 4, Akron flew over the inauguration of President Franklin Roosevelt. That same night, she returned to Lakehurst and cold temperatures. The cold held for nearly a week, curtailing flight operations. As soon as it warmed enough, McCord set off for the warmer climes of Florida and the Bahamas. The grueling schedule continued throughout the rest of the month.
Then came the fickle winds of April.
Akron lifted off from Lakehurst on April 3,1933, at 7:28 P.M.
Commander Frank McCord was in charge, and he was assisted by Lieutenant Commander Herbert Wiley as his executive officer, as well as Lieutenant Dugan as his engineering officer. The crew would consist of seventy-six officers and men, including Rear Admiral Moffett, who wanted to see Akron in operation firsthand.