Hacker News Reader

Comment by Forgeties79 | Hacker News Reader

I think his point is that most of these are measurable, concrete problems that can be solved or mitigated enough to be considered "safe," in the same way airplanes have all sorts of risks and issues we solved or mitigated to make them safer than the cars many use every day.

View on HN

The way I see it, aircraft have become mechanically reliable and airships could become mechanically reliable too. But airships will always be structurally vulnerable relative to aircraft. They're inherently very light with very large surface areas and there's no way around this.

The strength to weight ratio of a carbon fibre scaffolding would be far superior to steel.

Isn't the clothy stuff the problem though rather than the scaffolding?

Same on most sailboats: what makes them get into trouble is not the hull cracking but rather the sail tearing up in a storm or the mast snapping off and making them uncontrollable / sink.

(Im guessing out loud here, statements probably wrong)

If the clothy bits tear on a sailboat it’s an inconvenience. When the hard bits (eg keel) fail, it’s a problem.

Mast snapping happens. Rudder snapping off is also bad. Often the issue is running into rocks/a reef due to a navigation failure. Sails do tear, but for sailboats I don’t think it’s as simple as the clothy bits being the main weak point. I don’t know about airships though.

For airships, the entire structure (frame, envelope, gas bags) are at the limits of materials engineering. Failure of any of the components is both likely and catastrophic to the craft.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com