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The temperature at liftoff was 41 degrees Fahrenheit, and the barometer read 29.72. Akron was carrying 73,600 gallons of fuel, enough for six days aloft, though this cruise was scheduled for forty-eight hours. Because of the fog, plane operations had just been canceled. As Akron lifted from the pad then turned her bow east, one of the pilots who was securing his Curtiss on the runway turned and stared up at the giant blimp. She was a beauty, no doubt about that — her silver fuselage at bow and stem was lit by the red and blue of the ground lights, while the red and green of her ru
“Set a course east to Philadelphia,” McCord instructed the navigator. “The weather report indicates they have only scattered clouds.”
“Aye, Captain,” the navigator said.
Less than an hour later, Akron passed over Philadelphia, finding the visibility fair to good. In the control car, McCord stared at the latest weather report. A thunderstorm was being reported in Washington, D.C., and was said to be moving north and east toward them. McCord decided on a course east by southeast to skirt the storm. If all worked according to plan, he would miss the storm’s fury and arrive off Newport, Rhode Island, for a test scheduled for seven the next morning.
The test would never happen.
Saint Elmo’s fire. The brush discharge of electricity was dancing from the flagstaff of Phoebus. A flaming phenomenon that never signaled calm or comfort, a sign of disturbances in the heavens, a beacon of foul weather as sure as a snowball in the face.
Captain Carl Dalldorf burped as his ship rocked, tasting the sour tang of a dill pickle. Phoebus, a motor tanker registered in Danzig, Germany, was crewed by Germans. Dalldorf and his crew had spent a fine weekend in upper Manhattan, mingling with the German population and frequenting the Bierstubes. Casting off from Pier 6 at 2 P.M., Phoebus was bound for Tampico, Mexico. The ship had spent most of the afternoon and evening in a pea-soup fog. Now, just before 11 P.M., lightning began to strike the water around the vessel, while thunder reverberated loudly from the heavens.
Dalldorf stared at his barometer. There had been a sharp drop.
He knew the signs — this was a storm that bore watching.
Up the Delaware River, starboard back across New Jersey, hit the water near Asbury Park — that was the course. But the storm kept advancing.
“Get me the latest weather map,” McCord said, just after 11 P.M.
Wiley headed for the aerological office above the control car and consulted with Lieutenant Herb Wescoat. Wiley liked Wescoat, who, unlike some of the meteorological officers Wiley had served with, had at least an inkling of a sense of humor.
“What have you got?” Wiley asked.
“We received about two-thirds of the map — it came in code,” Wescoat replied, handing Wiley the copy.
“This doesn’t look too promising,” Wiley noted.
“No,” Wescoat said, “it doesn’t.”
“Do you have any recommendations for the captain?” Wiley asked.
“I’d ask him to land as soon as possible,” Wescoat said logically.
“I doubt he’ll do that with Admiral Moffett aboard,” Wiley said.
“Hmm,” Wescoat said slowly. “Then I’d recommend we all pray.”
Captain Dalldorf was due to remain on watch until midnight. By the look of the storm, he might stay on duty a while longer. A rogue wave had just rolled over Phoebus’s bow, a most rare occurrence. In addition, not five minutes before, his second in command had come across a sailor lying in the rain on the walkway outside the pilothouse. After he was revived, the man explained that when he’d gone to grip a handrail, an electrical charge had shocked him and thrown him back six feet, where he’d struck his head. That was just bizarre. Lightning usually passes through ships, leaving no damage. Dalldorf guessed that because Phoebus was carrying a load of truck batteries to Mexico, maybe the pooled energy had somehow created the shock.
Whatever the case, the storm and the general feeling in the air were disturbing.
“Bring me some more coffee,” Dalldorf ordered a crewman. Then he lit an American-made cigarette and took a puff.
They were minutes from death and miles from safety, as April 3 became April 4.
A lightning bolt streaked through the sky, and Akron was lit as though it were in the beam of a spotlight. At just that instant, the control car lurched from side to side.
“Drop ballast,” Commander McCord ordered.
A second later, the helmsman lost control of the rudder as the wires parted. The wheel began to spin wildly. Five squawks rang out over the telephone system, signaling landing positions. Akron continued to lose altitude.
“Drop more ballast,” McCord ordered.
Just then, a horrible shrieking was heard from the hull of Akron. The ship’s structure was breaking apart. The upper fin had been lost to the violence of the storm, and the strain from the loss of the fin broke frame girders. Some of the broken girders punctured the helium bags. Akron began to leak like a water-filled balloon poked by a pin. The airship continued to descend.
Wiley stared from a small window in the control car, as the blimp lowered through the thick fog. At about two hundred feet, he first caught sight of the waves below.
“I see the water approaching,” he said ominously.
No one in the control car replied.
Throughout Akron, the seventy-plus men made preparations for a water landing. Those with time fastened their coats firmly; a few managed to grab some light personal items. One scribbled a note to loved ones and stuffed it into the pipe forming one end of his hammock, never to be recovered. Many simply awaited the inevitable.
Akron sagged lower, her bones broken and her lungs punctured.
Then, at a distance of less than fifty feet above the waves, she stopped and hung in the air for a moment. There was no doubt she was a beautiful ship. A second later, a final lightning bolt lit her gleaming silver hull and surrounded the ship with a glow of electrical energy.
Then, like a rock dropped from a bridge, Akron plunged down into the ocean.
“The lights have disappeared,” the lookout declared.
“Are you certain?” Dalldorf asked.
“Yes, sir,” the lookout noted, “they dropped below the horizon a minute ago.”
“It’s probably an aircraft,” Dalldorf said. “Fix our position.”
The navigator took a minute to make notes on a sheet of paper. “Latitude 39 degrees, 40 minutes north; longitude 73 degrees, 40 minutes west,” he said.
Just then his second in command burst through the door of the pilothouse.
“The smell of gasoline is very heavy,” he said. “It’s all around us in the water.”
“Prepare to lower lifeboat number one,” Dalldorf said, “and stand by to rescue survivors.”
Phoebus remained until first light, when the Coast Guard arrived. Three men were taken aboard the German vessel. They were the only survivors of the crash of Akron.
II
No Surfing in New Jersey 1986
Once I began researching early airships and their often tragic endings, I became hooked on their fascinating stories. The stories of Akron and her sister rigid airships Macon and Shenandoah tell of a bright future turned dark when all three fell out of the sky and crashed. I wondered if any of their wreckage had gone undiscovered.