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When the zeppelin LZ-129 Hindenburg catches fire at Lakehurst Naval Air Station for landing. The zeppelin explodes into an inferno and crashes, killing 35 of the 97 people on board and one ground crew member.
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00:011937. The Hindenburg, the world's largest flying machine, arrives in the United States with 97 people on board.
00:10It's the end of a successful transatlantic flight.
00:13Moments from landing, a fierce fire erupts.
00:16In just 34 seconds, the mighty airship is destroyed.
00:2136 people perish. Many suffer agonizing burns.
00:25But what caused the devastating fire?
00:30Now, a 21st century air crash detective reexamines one of the most famous air disasters in history.
00:38Using advanced computer simulations, we reveal what really destroyed the Hindenburg.
00:44Disasters don't just happen. They're a chain of critical events.
00:49Unravel the clues and count down those final seconds from disaster.
01:02Europe. Germany. Frankfurt. May 3, 1937.
01:13The LZ-129 Hindenburg, the largest flying machine ever built, emerges from its hangar.
01:19Its destination, Lakehurst, New Jersey.
01:24This is no ordinary crossing. It's the launch of the world's first scheduled flight service across the Atlantic.
01:30Since rolling out of the hangar in March 1936, the airship has made a series of 62 successful trial and
01:37publicity flights.
01:41Built by the Zeppelin company, the Hindenburg is 245 meters long, as big as an ocean liner, and stands as
01:48tall as a 13-story building.
01:52The 36 passengers boarding tonight will spend the flight on the passenger deck towards the airship's nose.
02:02Most, a high-profile businessman, but also on the passenger list, is one of the first families ever to fly
02:08in the Hindenburg.
02:09Hermann and Matilda Doerner, and their three children, Irena, Walter and Werner.
02:15The wealthy family live 11,000 kilometers away in Mexico, and are returning from a vacation in their German homeland.
02:24For eight-year-old Werner, flying in an airship is a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
02:30The Zeppelins, in general, was the word of the day, and it was the fancy way to go.
02:37Airships are considered the cruise liners of the future, but for now they are the sole preserve of the seriously
02:43wealthy.
02:43A one-way ticket costs $400, that's over $5,000 in today's money.
02:50It buys the ultimate luxury travel experience.
02:53A restaurant serving cordon bleu cuisine and the finest wines.
02:58Fashionably designed lounge areas, and of course, spectacular views from the promenade deck.
03:06Then a sister, Irena, is 14.
03:08For her, the voyage is a chance to leave childhood behind and mix in sophisticated adult circles for the first
03:15time.
03:16It was sort of special for her.
03:18Somehow, during this trip, she grew up enough so that she asked her blades to be cut and she had
03:24a new hairdo.
03:26And she was now a young lady.
03:32Down on the ground, a crowd gathers to watch the launch.
03:35For many, just seeing this massive flying machine up close is a thrilling experience.
03:43As passengers board, all their lighters and matches are confiscated.
03:47And they are expressly forbidden from straying outside the designated passenger areas.
03:52With good reason.
03:55The airship's outer skin is made of strong cotton and linen, waterproofed and tightened with a chemical paint called dope.
04:04Inside the skin are 16 gas bags, over 30 meters tall, holding nearly 200,000 cubic meters of hydrogen.
04:13A highly flammable, lighter-than-air gas that gives the airship its lift.
04:21Forward of the passenger deck, slung beneath the airship, is its nerve center, the control car.
04:27In command is Max Preuss.
04:30He's one of the company's most experienced captains with over 20 years flying experience.
04:35And he's captain the Hindenburg on 22 flights.
04:408.15pm.
04:41Right on schedule, Captain Preuss orders the ground crew to release the landing ropes.
04:48The flight crew dumps 590 kilograms of water ballast and the airship begins to rise.
04:58When it reaches 60 meters, the crew starts up the four 1100 horsepower diesel-fueled propeller engines.
05:13On the passenger deck, the Dörners waved goodbye to friends and family below.
05:19For Matilda Dörner, leaving her homeland once again, it's a poignant moment.
05:23I remember my mother had tears in her eyes when the ship lifted.
05:29That was so seldom for her.
05:31I can hardly remember her seeing tears in her eyes any time.
05:39Within minutes, the Hindenburg reaches its top speed of 125 kilometers per hour.
05:45The 6,500-kilometer voyage should take just two and a half days, just over half the time taken by
05:52a ship.
05:52Its flight path will take it over Holland, down the English Channel and across the Atlantic to America's east coast.
05:59The Zeppelin company is sending its head of operations, Ernst Lehmann, to oversee this critical flight.
06:05Lehmann is an enthusiastic supporter of Germany's ruling Nazi party.
06:11He's on board to ensure the Hindenburg stays on schedule.
06:14Any delays would be deeply embarrassing.
06:18But as Lehmann knows, the Hindenburg has an Achilles heel.
06:22Bad weather.
06:24Strong winds can blow the airship off course.
06:27They also make its complex landing maneuvers more difficult.
06:31A bad storm could even put the airship in danger.
06:36In 1930, the pride of the British Empire, the R101 airship, was en route to India.
06:41It hit a storm over France and went down nose first.
06:45The resulting crash killed 48 of the 54 people on board.
06:49The tragedy ended the British airship program.
06:54Between 1925 and 1935, the US Navy lost three of its airships in severe weather.
07:01By 1937, only one, the Los Angeles, is still in service.
07:07Assistant cabin steward Werner France isn't worried.
07:10The Zeppelin company has a 100% safety record in 27 years of flying passenger airships.
07:17And 14-year-old Werner knows that in hard times like this, he's lucky to have a job.
07:26I was very proud to be part of the crew and to go on all those journeys.
07:30To see all those countries.
07:32My father was out of work at the time and we had very little money.
07:39To be part of this, it was incredible.
07:46But there's a new threat facing passengers and crew on the Hindenburg today.
07:51Under Germany's dictator, Adolf Hitler, the Nazis are rearming for war.
07:56They are also brutally suppressing all opposition at home.
08:00The Hindenburg's construction was part-funded by Hitler and it's become a powerful Nazi propaganda tool.
08:07But the airship's iconic status also makes it the target for opponents of the Nazi regime.
08:13In 1933, the Reichstag, the Nazi-controlled German parliament, was burned to the ground.
08:18The authorities blamed saboteurs.
08:21And now, just days ago, German authorities warned Ernst Lehmann that they'd received a specific threat to this crucial flight.
08:28Could saboteurs posing as innocent passengers or even crew members be on board with a deadly mission?
08:36To destroy the Hindenburg.
08:39Wednesday, May 5th.
08:41Day 3.
08:43Ernst Lehmann, Zeppelin Head of Operations and Captain Pruce, are worried.
08:48The Hindenburg should be making 125 km per hour.
08:52But strong headwinds mean the schedule is slipping.
08:55At this rate, they'll be 12 hours late.
09:01Joseph Spahr, a German living in Long Island, New York, is just a day away from a reunion with his
09:07family.
09:08He's been touring Germany with his music hall act of acrobatics and slapstick comedy.
09:13His next performance will be at Radio City Music Hall in New York.
09:18He's taking a dog home as a surprise for his children.
09:21It's spending the flight in the freight area on a lower deck.
09:26Spahr needs to feed the dog regularly.
09:28But it's in a restricted area.
09:30So he's been warned that he has to be escorted by a crew member.
09:38Ernst Lehmann, Captain Pruce and a Zeppelin Company observer are the only three on board aware of the sabotage threat
09:45to the Hindenburg.
09:47It's not the first time the airship has been threatened, so they treat it as a false alarm.
09:52And reassuringly, there are plainclothes intelligence officers on board, on the lookout for anyone acting suspiciously.
10:00But Captain Pruce has another problem.
10:03They're still battling against strong headwinds, so they're still 12 hours behind schedule.
10:09A riding late is bad enough, but the return flight to Frankfurt the following night is an important one, and
10:14it's fully booked.
10:15The airship will be packed with high society passengers flying to attend the coronation of King George VI in London.
10:22It's the event of the year.
10:24If the Hindenburg doesn't get the guests to Europe in time, Lehmann faces a PR disaster.
10:31The passengers finish their after-dinner drinks and retire to their cabins.
10:35It's their last night on the Hindenburg.
10:38In a few hours, they'll be in New Jersey.
10:42Then a France grabs a few hours sleep.
10:44Tomorrow he's going to be busy, preparing the airship for its return trip.
10:51Thursday, May 6th, 6 a.m.
10:54The Hindenburg should be landing at Lakehurst Naval Base.
10:57But it's still 1,130 kilometers away.
11:01The estimated arrival time is 6 p.m., 12 hours behind schedule.
11:08Lehmann and Pruce should have 16 hours to land the airship, disembark the passengers and freight,
11:13and complete refueling and reprovisioning before heading back to Europe at 10 p.m.
11:18Today, they'll only have four hours.
11:21It's going to be tight.
11:252 p.m.
11:28Mrs. Derner packs the family's bags.
11:31On the passenger deck, Joseph Spahr can't wait to see his wife and children.
11:37He knows how thrilled they'll be when they see the dog he's bought for them.
11:42The Hindenburg approaches New York, just 80 kilometers northeast of their destination.
11:47Captain Pruce treats the passengers to a bird's eye view of the Manhattan skyline.
11:54From a crew lookout area at the top of the airship,
11:5714-year-old cabin boy, Werner Franz, marvels at his first glimpse of the new world.
12:06We approached New York.
12:09This sea of buildings, the Statue of Liberty, the skyscrapers.
12:14All that was something I'd never seen before.
12:17Saturday.
12:203 p.m.
12:21The Hindenburg appears out of the clouds over the airfield at Lakehurst.
12:26Base commander Charles Rosendahl watches the giant airship pass over the hangar.
12:31He's a veteran airship commander with 13 years flying experience.
12:35And he's worried.
12:37A thunderstorm is developing and winds are picking up.
12:41Landing an airship is a delicate operation requiring accurate maneuvering.
12:46Attempting it in bad weather could end in disaster.
12:51Rosendahl radios Captain Pruce.
12:53He recommends delaying the landing until the conditions improve.
12:56Radio this to the end of our...
12:57Very good, sir.
12:59Pruce has no choice but to turn the airship away.
13:02He heads southwest to a way to break in the weather.
13:08Pruce and Lehman know that any chance of making the 10 p.m. departure is rapidly disappearing.
13:14But first, Pruce must focus on landing the airship.
13:185.12 p.m.
13:20At Lakehurst, the wind eases.
13:23Commander Rosendahl radios the Hindenburg.
13:25He tells Pruce,
13:26Conditions now suitable for landing.
13:28Ground crew is ready.
13:31Captain Pruce turns the airship back towards Lakehurst.
13:34But it encounters increasingly heavy rain, which slows its progress.
13:406.08 p.m.
13:43With no sign of the airship and anxious to get it down while the weather holds,
13:47Base Commander Rosendahl calls the Hindenburg again.
13:50He tells them,
13:51Conditions definitely improved recommend earliest possible landing.
13:56At last, the Hindenburg flies over the airfield.
13:59The rain is now just a light drizzle, but there's still a thunderstorm in the area.
14:04The passengers make for the promenade areas for the final moments of the flight.
14:096.11 p.m.
14:13Captain Pruce swings the airship round to land into the wind, the safest way of landing.
14:196.13 p.m.
14:21Suddenly, the wind veers to the southeast.
14:25Pruce has to think fast.
14:27He can abort and go round the airfield to line up with the wind.
14:31But this will lose precious time.
14:34Captain Pruce decides to land straight away.
14:37But this means he must turn the airship into the wind fast.
14:42He orders the crew to make a sharp left turn.
14:466.17 p.m.
14:50Now Captain Pruce notices the ship is heavy at the rear.
14:54He must balance the airship before landing or he risks damaging the tail.
14:59He orders over 1,000 kilograms of ballast from the ship's water tanks to be jettisoned.
15:066.19 p.m.
15:08Pruce orders a final sharp right turn to line up with the mast.
15:12The airship is still sloping to the rear.
15:16Pruce orders six crew members from their mess hall in the rear to come to the nose of the ship
15:21to add more weight at the front.
15:256.20 p.m.
15:27The airship finally arrives at the landing area.
15:30They slow and hover over the airfield.
15:33A crowd gathers to witness the Hindenburg's first landing in America this year.
15:38Newsreel teams record the arrival hoping to get some exciting pictures of the airship's landing procedure.
15:46Now all that remains is for the crew to lower a cable from the nose to the mooring mast.
15:51The ground crew will then winch the Hindenburg down to the mast.
15:56Before lowering the mooring cable, Pruce must first drop two anchor ropes.
16:00These are held by the ground crew to stop the airship drifting.
16:056.21 p.m.
16:07The first anchor rope drops to the ground, closely followed by the second.
16:13Eight-year-old Werner Doerner and his family take one last look out of the window, down at the crowds
16:18below.
16:19Soon, they'll be disembarking.
16:22His father films the ground crew waving up to them.
16:24He's captured some thrilling images of life on the world's largest flying machine.
16:31The giant airship hovers 60 meters above the ground.
16:35Captain Pruce prepares to lower the mooring cable.
16:396.25 p.m.
16:436.25 p.m.
16:43Suddenly, the crowds on the ground see flames appear around the fin.
16:48Then the airship's nose rears up.
16:51Tables and chairs slide backwards.
16:53Passengers tumble down.
16:55Werner Doerner feels the air turn to a furnace-like heat.
17:01Suddenly, the air was on fire.
17:03In an instant, the whole thing was on fire.
17:07The world's largest flying machine is now a blazing inferno.
17:1197 people, including the three Doerner children, are trapped inside the Hindenburg, 60 meters above the ground.
17:2036 passengers are just moments from disembarking from the Hindenburg when disaster strikes.
17:27In the control car, the crew feel a massive jolt.
17:30An officer shouts, the ship's on fire.
17:33The nose rears up over 100 meters above the ground.
17:38The fire roars through the airship.
17:41Within seconds, the Hindenburg is engulfed in flames.
17:45U.S. Navy Petty Officer John Iannacone is one of the 200-plus ground crew.
17:51He's landed the Hindenburg safely 10 times in the last year.
17:54But now, he can't believe what he's seeing.
17:58I saw this big red fireball, and then all of a sudden it just went poof, and broke through the
18:05fabric, and everybody started running away.
18:08It scared the heck of us, because we didn't know whether it was going to explode like a big bomb
18:12or just catch on fire.
18:14Werner Franz is trapped on the walkway on the lower deck.
18:17He must find a way out before the flames reach him.
18:22Right away, this bang told you that a major catastrophe had happened.
18:26You knew right away the airship was lost.
18:29The airship was burning and couldn't be saved.
18:33Werner stumbles along the gangway, looking for a way out, but he trips and falls.
18:41He grabs the rope handrail and holds on.
18:48As I was hanging onto these ropes, everything I had experienced in my life came back as if it were
18:53a film.
18:59Werner sits on the gangway and kicks through the canvas.
19:02He jumps out of the blazing airship and onto the ground five meters below.
19:07Gripped with fear, he runs away into the arms of a fellow crew member.
19:11I lost control and started screaming, and he put me right again, saying,
19:18What's the matter? You're all right, aren't you? Control yourself.
19:22Go and see if you can help someone.
19:26But Werner is too terrified to return into the flaming wreckage.
19:33These half-burned creatures came running past me.
19:38Nothing could persuade me to go back into the airship.
19:46The fire rushes up the airship.
19:49The Dörners are still in the passenger lounge.
19:51If they don't get out now, they'll burn.
19:54But they're still nine meters up.
19:59Matilda Dörner shouts to her 14-year-old daughter, Irena, to jump out of the window.
20:03But the girl is too frightened.
20:08Mrs. Dörner picks up her eight-year-old son, Werner.
20:11She tries to throw him out of the window, but he falls back.
20:15Somehow, she finds the strength to lift him again.
20:20This time, she succeeds, and Werner falls to the ground with his brother.
20:25She turns to her daughter again, pleading with her to jump.
20:31But Irena is paralyzed with fear.
20:35And instead, turns away towards the flames, looking for her father.
20:44In desperation, Mrs. Dörner jumps out after her sons.
20:51Acrobat Joseph Spahr also jumps from the passenger lounge.
20:55He rolls onto the grass, picks himself up, and limps away.
20:59But he's unable to rescue his dog, which perishes in the fire.
21:0534 seconds after the first flame appears, the Hindenburg is consumed by the Inferno.
21:12The wreckage crashes to the ground.
21:15It's totally destroyed.
21:17Ambulances rush survivors to hospital.
21:20Werner Dörner and his mother are severely injured.
21:23His brother, Walter, suffers minor burns.
21:26But his father dies inside the airship.
21:29A crewman rescues Werner's sister Irena from the burning wreckage.
21:33But she's close to death.
21:35My sister's condition was so bad that they had taken her to a different place.
21:41Inside the hospital, probably in intensive care.
21:44My mother very much complained about being separated from her daughter.
21:51In the morning, doctors bring Matilda Dörner news.
21:54Her daughter Irena died in the night from her burns.
21:58She was just 14 years old.
22:01My mother was very much upset with the authorities in the hospital,
22:05that she never got to see her again.
22:07But that was probably the best thing, because she must have been in very bad shape.
22:13Captain Proust survives, but is badly burned.
22:16Ernst Lehmann is fatally injured.
22:20Of the 97 people on board, 29 are dead.
22:24One ground crewman perishes.
22:26Another six people die in hospital.
22:34News of the Hindenburg's loss stuns people around the world.
22:38For the first time, cameras have captured a disaster on film as it happens.
22:43Shocked movie theater audiences watch in horror as newsreels play the crash and its terrible aftermath.
22:53But what caused this tragedy?
22:56The Germans have a 100% safety record operating passenger airships.
23:00And the Hindenburg was a state of the art aircraft.
23:04The pride of the Third Reich.
23:07The United States and Germany open a joint inquiry.
23:11They interview the surviving crew members and passengers.
23:15They take testimonies from over 90 eyewitnesses.
23:19But in 1937, there is very little cockpit technology to conduct a conclusive crash investigation.
23:25And in the 68 years since the disaster, many different theories, some highly controversial, have emerged.
23:33Debate still rages today over what really downed the celebrated airship.
23:39Now, Seconds from Disaster reexamines the investigation into the loss of the Hindenburg.
23:46Using modern day forensics and scientific experiments, we will finally solve the mystery.
23:52What was it that started the fire aboard the Hindenburg?
23:55Could it have been an act of sabotage?
23:57And what really fueled the blaze so that it consumed the whole ship in 34 seconds?
24:04Advanced computer simulation will take us where no camera can go, into the heart of the disaster zone.
24:12Greg Fyfe is one of the United States most experienced crash detectives.
24:17He has 20 years of service with the National Transportation Safety Board.
24:21For eight of those, he was the investigator in charge of the team that attends every major crash site in
24:27America, known as the Go Team.
24:30He's worked on some of the world's most complex and baffling air crashes.
24:34And so far, he's solved every one of them.
24:37But there's one disaster he's always wanted to explore.
24:41The Hindenburg mystery has intrigued me just because you had this magnificent flying machine that fell into a major disaster,
24:50a very cataclysmic disaster, and nobody really had an idea of what caused it.
24:56But Fyfe brings a modern crash investigator's expertise and forensic skills to the disaster.
25:01He must keep an open mind as he investigates every possible reason for the crash.
25:07In any major explosion in a modern aircraft, all eyes immediately turn to terrorism.
25:14Any time you have an in-flight fire, you have to think the worst.
25:18You have to try and determine what led to that in-flight fire.
25:21You go to the extreme, and the extreme is sabotage.
25:26Fyfe learns that the Hindenburg received many sabotage threats in its one year of operations, but who would want to
25:33destroy it?
25:34Rick Ziderosa is vice president of the Lakehurst Historical Society and a specialist in the Hindenburg era.
25:42As the Nazi regime became increasingly unpopular throughout the world, it was also going to face a new set of
25:48security concerns.
25:50And there were heightened fears that perhaps an act of sabotage could be carried out against the airship.
25:56Greg Feith examines the original report for evidence of sabotage warnings.
26:01He finds that Ernst Lehmann received intelligence from the German authorities warning of a specific threat.
26:08But who had a motive?
26:10Hitler and his Nazi party had many enemies in Germany.
26:13They carried out a brutal policy of repression against Jewish people, socialists, communists and outspoken writers.
26:20Any one of these people might have been happy to see the Hindenburg destroyed.
26:25Feith checks the official reports and finds the one passenger who could have had the opportunity to destroy the Hindenburg.
26:33Joseph Spahr.
26:35After the crash, Spahr comes under intense scrutiny.
26:38He lives in America with his wife and family, but he is German.
26:43And for the last few months, he's been traveling all over Europe.
26:46This is just the sort of background that rings alarm bells with German intelligence.
26:51According to the FBI report, Joseph Spahr did act suspiciously.
26:56In fact, Spahr accessed high security areas where no passengers were allowed, apparently, to visit his dog.
27:03The fact that Spahr is an acrobat with great agility means he could easily climb in and around the Hindenburg's
27:09narrow passageways.
27:11Could Spahr have used his dog as a cover to plant a bomb?
27:15Was this music hall clown really a ruthless terrorist responsible for the destruction of the Hindenburg and the deaths of
27:2336 people?
27:26Air crash investigator Greg Feith is trying to get to the bottom of one of aviation's great mysteries.
27:33Why did the Hindenburg airship burst into flames and crash at Lakehurst Naval Base in 1937?
27:41Many of the crew and officers of the Hindenburg were convinced the cause was sabotage.
27:47Feith wants to see if the theory stands up.
27:50He finds an intriguing statement in the report about one of the passengers.
27:56Acrobat Joseph Spahr did disappear into unauthorized areas where the fuel tanks were kept on several occasions on his own.
28:05He told the crew he was going to check on his dog.
28:09Could he actually have been looking for somewhere to plant a bomb?
28:14Feith knows that the FBI investigated Spahr and was unable to find any motive.
28:19But he wants to put Spahr's actions aboard the airship under the microscope himself.
28:25He doesn't have much to go on, no flight data recorder or cockpit voice recorder.
28:32He studies the film footage.
28:35He reads eyewitness reports.
28:38They state that the fire started at the top of the airship near the vertical fin.
28:43For Spahr to reach this area, he would have to climb up a 30 meter shaft.
28:49Even with his acrobatic agility, this would take several minutes.
28:54And he would have to somehow avoid being challenged by the many crewmen patrolling this area.
29:01And if he were caught, he could hardly claim to be feeding his dog when it was stored in the
29:05freight area at the foot of the airship.
29:09Why would he have taken so many risks when he had ample opportunity to plant a bomb here, which would
29:14have had just as deadly an effect?
29:18Feith decides it's too far-fetched and rules Spahr out as the potential saboteur.
29:24And there's another hard fact that for him almost certainly rules out sabotage altogether.
29:31He finds it inconceivable that no one came forward after the crash to claim that they had destroyed such a
29:38symbol of Nazi supremacy.
29:41In this 70 year period, nobody's ever taken claim or produced any kind of evidence that would say that this
29:48was an act of sabotage and not something else.
29:53So, if it's not a terrorist act, what else could set the airship on fire?
29:59The joint reports state that a spark ignites leaking hydrogen that consumes the airship in 34 seconds.
30:07Hydrogen certainly seems the obvious culprit.
30:10It's highly flammable when mixed with air, and the Hindenburg had 16 gas cells with a total of 200,000
30:17cubic meters of hydrogen.
30:19But in nearly 70 years since the accident, many experts have cast doubt on the idea that hydrogen was the
30:25fatal accelerant in the fire.
30:27The Germans were aware of the dangers of hydrogen, so they took every possible precaution.
30:32All passenger cigarette lighters and matches are confiscated at the start of the voyage as a fire precaution.
30:38And hydrogen can only ignite when mixed with air.
30:43Feith shifts his attention to some recent theories.
30:46Some experts claim that leaking diesel fuel caught fire first, and only then hydrogen once the fire had spread.
30:54Feith studies the Hindenburg blueprints.
30:56There are 88,000 litres of diesel stored in tanks at the bottom of the airship.
31:02The fuel lines run from the tanks to the four exterior mounted engines.
31:08Could there have been a fuel leak in one of these lines?
31:12Looking back through the Hindenburg's flying history, he comes across a statement made by an American observer.
31:19Harold Dick, an engineer working for the US airship company Goodyear, was invited by the Germans to attend the trial
31:25flights in 1936.
31:28On one of these, he noticed a strong smell of diesel in the keel, or bottom of the airship.
31:34Greg Feith finds that on a later flight, Dick notes that the main fuel lines do not seem to be
31:39particularly tight.
31:41This fuel leak theory now looks attractive to Feith.
31:44But he needs to know, if there was a fuel leak, what ignited it?
31:48The most likely cause would be a short circuit and the electrical cables creating a spark.
31:54Feith checks the report for any evidence of electrical failure on the fatal flight.
32:01According to the original inquiry, a crew member responsible for monitoring all the electrical indicators, fuses and circuit breakers, saw
32:08nothing unusual.
32:11But Feith knows there's always a possibility the crew member missed something.
32:16And if he did miss a short circuit, Feith needs to know if any electric cables run close enough to
32:21the fuel lines to ignite the diesel.
32:25He checks the plans and finds that electrical cables do run near the fuel lines.
32:31So there could be a spark right next to leaking diesel fuel.
32:36But Feith isn't convinced that a spark would ignite diesel.
32:39He knows that diesel has a high flash point.
32:42It must reach nearly 65 degrees Celsius before it'll catch fire.
32:47If there were a diesel leak, it would have to be heated up to that point before a spark could
32:52ignite it.
32:55Feith studies the airship plans to see if there is any point where diesel comes into contact with a heat
33:00source.
33:02He finds just one, the engine roads.
33:05This is the hottest point the fuel passes through before feeding the 1100 horsepower engines.
33:10But there's a problem.
33:12The engines are all externally mounted, suspended below the airship.
33:17If a fire had started here, then eyewitnesses on the ground would have clearly seen it.
33:23Instead, they all report that the fire started at the top of the ship.
33:27To have a fire ignite on the bottom of the airship, propagate through the entire diameter of the airship,
33:35and then exit out the top in a very short period of time without anyone noticing, is very remote.
33:42Greg Feith rules out a diesel leak as the cause of the blaze that engulfed the Hindenburg.
33:47Now he turns to the other prominent theory for the blaze.
33:50Not something inside the ship, but its outer skin.
33:55The outer covering is a cotton linen material painted with a chemical known as dope,
34:00that waterproofs the airship and protects the gas bags from the heat of the sun's rays.
34:06The dope used on the Hindenburg was a new type of paint called cellulose acetate butyrate.
34:12This dope is more flammable than previous paints.
34:19The paint theory states that somehow the skin of the airship caught fire.
34:26The Hindenburg burned fast.
34:28The footage reveals that the fire swept through the entire airship in just 34 seconds.
34:33Would the doped outer cover really be so flammable?
34:37When you look at the fabric that was used to cover the Hindenburg, it's a cotton linen material.
34:42So on its own, of course, it's flammable.
34:45But it was impregnated with this doping material.
34:47And while it too has some flammable capability or characteristics to it,
34:52can it burn that fast is the big question.
34:55Feith decides to conduct an experiment to test the paint theory.
34:58He prepares a sample of the outer cover.
35:01It's made from exactly the same type of linen cotton material.
35:05The cloth is doped with a mixture of iron oxide powder and aluminium powder, just like the skin of the
35:11Hindenburg.
35:12If the material is the accelerant, this experiment will prove it.
35:18For safety, the test is done outside.
35:22If there's any wind, it's likely to push the flame in one direction faster than the other.
35:27So to compensate for this, he uses two stopwatches to time the burn.
35:32Go.
35:35As soon as the flame reaches the edge of the inner circle, he starts the clocks.
35:41When the flames reach the outer edge, he stops the clocks.
35:46One minute for the wind-assisted side.
35:49And one minute and eight seconds for the flame to travel against the wind.
35:53Both much too slow.
35:55The Hindenburg, all 245 meters, burns in 34 seconds.
36:01At the burn rate Feith's time, the Hindenburg would have taken 40 hours to be destroyed.
36:07Greg Feith concludes the outer skin cannot be the fatal accelerant.
36:11So what did burn the Hindenburg?
36:15Was the original report right after all?
36:17Was it the hydrogen?
36:20From the investigative standpoint, you have to wonder what can burn that quickly
36:25and literally take an 800-foot tube and destroy it in a matter of seconds.
36:32Feith Commission's Professor Nick Syred, a mechanical engineer with 30 years' experience specializing in combustion rates,
36:38to calculate if it was hydrogen that burned the Hindenburg.
36:43The airship was 245 meters long.
36:47Professor Syred knows from scientific study
36:49that hydrogen can burn at a rate of 9 meters per second.
36:53I make calculations of the flame speed of hydrogen
36:56and it's perfectly consistent then within about 30 seconds or so
37:01that a flame can engulf the whole of the Hindenburg.
37:05There is nothing else on the airship which can burn that quickly
37:09and cause the Hindenburg to be destroyed in the same period of time.
37:15Greg Feith concludes that hydrogen is the fatal accelerant for the fire that tore through the Hindenburg,
37:20consuming it in 34 seconds.
37:23But the hydrogen would have had to escape to mix with air before it could become flammable.
37:30Trawling through the witness testimonies, he finds something that could suggest a hydrogen leak.
37:37Eyewitnesses on the ground notice a fluttering at the top of the airship,
37:40near the vertical fin, just before the fire starts.
37:44Could they be seeing escaped hydrogen pushing against the outer envelope?
37:50The original report concluded this may have been the case.
37:54But Feith wants to find out how the hydrogen could leak out.
37:58He studies the composition of the gas cells.
38:01They're made of a special plastic film,
38:04sandwiched between two layers of thick cotton.
38:07It would take considerable force to rupture these cells.
38:11Is there anything on the airship capable of causing such damage?
38:15Next, Feith focuses on the Hindenburg's bracing wires.
38:19Thousands of cables that are vital to the overall strength of the machine.
38:24There are over 200 kilometers of wire bracing the airframe.
38:28They're each about 3 millimeters thick, made of steel similar to piano wire,
38:33with a braking stress of 450 kilograms.
38:37Is it possible for one of these wires to snap?
38:40He checks the maintenance records and finds out that bracing wires have snapped on airships in the past.
38:48Feith examines the Hindenburg's final journey
38:50to find out if anything could have put the airship under structural stress.
38:54He first checks the weather conditions.
38:57The airship battled strong headwinds all the way across the Atlantic.
39:01But according to the flying logs, it had flown through worse conditions in the past.
39:06But, examining the last moments of the flight, Feith finds a critical clue.
39:12Shortly before the fire, the Hindenburg makes its final approach.
39:15Then, suddenly, the wind changes direction,
39:18and Captain Pruss orders the crew to make a sharp left turn.
39:23Finally, Pruss orders another sharp turn, this time to the right, to line up with the mooring mast.
39:29But would these tight turns snap a bracing wire?
39:33Feith checks the design plans and finds that the Hindenburg wasn't designed to make sharp turns.
39:40As the airship turns, it generates sideways pressure on the tail fin.
39:45The Hindenburg is 245 meters long.
39:48If it turns too sharply, it could put too much stress on the airframe.
39:52A bracing wire could snap under this kind of tension.
39:58In a tight turn, the greatest stress on the airship is just forward at the tail fin.
40:03And Feith knows, from eyewitness reports, that this is where the fire probably started.
40:10If a wire did snap, the whiplash effect would be so violent, it could slash through the gas bag's protected
40:16covering.
40:20And Feith also realizes that the airship may have been leaning to the rear as a result of hydrogen leaking
40:26from a cell.
40:28They did have some support tension wires that had broken in the past,
40:31and because that the captain was making very hard turns left and right,
40:35it could have caused one of those tension straps to break,
40:38sliced a hole in that gas bag to allow the hydrogen to leak out.
40:42Greg Feith concludes that a snapped bracing wire caused the fatal leak of hydrogen.
40:48But this doesn't explain what could have ignited the escaping hydrogen.
40:53He studies the weather conditions at the time of the accident.
40:57The report states there was light rain over the airfield.
41:01A thunderstorm had recently passed by.
41:05There was lightning still visible to the south of Lakehurst.
41:10Although no one saw lightning strike the airship, these conditions create a highly charged electrical atmosphere.
41:17Could this have somehow caused the critical spark?
41:21It was well understood at the time that as an airship passes through the air,
41:26it gathers tens of thousands of volts of static electricity,
41:29just like a party balloon being rubbed on a sweater.
41:32The effect is increased in thundery conditions.
41:36While it remains aloft, the ship is in no danger, since the entire machine, the aluminium skeleton and the outer
41:42skin are all at the same level of charge.
41:45But all that changes when one part of the ship touches the ground.
41:50And Feith can see from the film footage exactly how that happened.
41:55In the final stages of landing, the crew dropped the first mooring ropes.
41:59The rain makes the ropes wet.
42:02And once they're wet, the charge from the airship's metal frame now rapidly flows through the ropes to the ground.
42:08Instantly, the airframe voltage falls to zero.
42:12But the airship's outer cover is made of a linen-cotton mixture that does not conduct electricity so easily.
42:19And it remains at high voltage, the perfect conditions for generating a spark between the skin and the frame.
42:28Greg Feith now knows how the spark that ignited the hydrogen was generated.
42:32He can now unravel what happened aboard the Hindenburg in those final, fateful seconds from disaster.
42:4214 minutes before the fire.
42:44The Hindenburg begins its final approach.
42:48Static electricity builds up on the ship, spread evenly throughout the structure.
42:5411 minutes to go.
42:56Without warning, the wind changes direction.
43:00Instead of going around the airfield in a wide sweep,
43:03Captain Prus, anxious to land the airship as soon as possible, makes a sharp left turn.
43:09Stressed by this sudden maneuver, somewhere near gas cell 4, a bracing wire snaps.
43:16The gas cell ruptures and hydrogen begins to leak out.
43:238 minutes before the catastrophe,
43:26Captain Prus notices that the ship is tail-heavy.
43:30He orders the crew to dump water to balance the ship.
43:34Then Prus orders another sharp turn, this time to the right,
43:38to line up with the mooring mast.
43:41The ship is still tail-heavy.
43:43Captain Prus orders six crew members to walk to the nose to try to counterbalance the sloping tail.
43:50But Prus is too concerned with landing to realize that the airship may be leaning as a result of hydrogen
43:55leaking.
43:58Four minutes left.
44:00The Hindenburg comes to a stop, and the crew drop the mooring ropes.
44:06Eyewitnesses on the ground notice a fluttering effect near the tail fin.
44:10They don't know it, but what they're seeing is leaking hydrogen pouring out of the doomed machine.
44:17By 6.25 PM, due to falling rain, the ropes are now wet.
44:22The electrical charge flows from the metal part of the airship to the ground.
44:28The aircraft's skin, less conductive than the metal, is still highly charged from a combination of the journey and the
44:35atmospheric conditions.
44:36It's now at a dangerously high voltage.
44:40Seeking the quickest way to the ground, a spark jumps from the outer skin to the metal, igniting the leaking
44:46hydrogen.
44:48The fire roars through the airship.
44:50There's 200,000 cubic meters of hydrogen in the 16 cells catch fire.
44:56Thirty-four seconds later, the mighty Hindenburg is destroyed.
45:01Thirty-six people are killed.
45:03But Greg Fyfe still has one piece of the puzzle to solve.
45:08How could the Hindenburg fire have been bright orange when hydrogen burns with an invisible flame?
45:17Greg Fyfe has concluded that the Hindenburg was destroyed after a spark caused by the thunderstorm conditions in the atmosphere
45:23ignited leaking hydrogen.
45:25But he still has one question.
45:28He knows that hydrogen burns with an invisible flame.
45:32And yet eyewitnesses stated that the Hindenburg burned with a bright orange glow.
45:39How could hydrogen burn this way?
45:43Fyfe sets up another experiment.
45:45He sets light to a stream of hydrogen.
45:47There's no visible flame.
45:50But as soon as he places some cloth in the hydrogen flame, the fire is visible.
45:57Hydrogen burns clear.
45:59That's not what the folks saw when they were observing the actual fire.
46:03The fire that they saw was the material, that covering material that finally ignited and burned.
46:10Going through the papers, Greg Fyfe realizes the tragedy could have been averted.
46:15He finds that the Zeppelin company had strict regulations governing landing procedures.
46:20In fact, in their training, crews were warned against landing in thunderstorm conditions.
46:28He learns that Dr. Eckener, the chairman of the company, blamed Captain Pruce and Ernst Lehmann for the accident.
46:35Dr. Eckener felt very much that it was pilot error.
46:39When he learned of the landing conditions, he was appalled and he was infuriated.
46:45He unequivocally held that the landing never should have been carried out as it was under those conditions.
46:50But Pruce is under pressure to land as fast as possible, to try and make up time on the schedule.
46:56He also has Ernst Lehmann, Zeppelin's director of operations, in the control car with him.
47:01He, too, is anxious to keep to the schedule.
47:07Instead of aborting the landing and waiting for better weather, they try to land in dangerous atmospheric conditions.
47:14Lehmann most definitely did influence Pruce in his decisions regarding the flight,
47:20which of course was increasingly held up by headwinds and then the delayed landing.
47:25The Hindenburg disaster spells the end of the commercial airship age.
47:30Germany grounds her other passenger airship, the Graf Zeppelin, until they can use the non-flammable helium as a lifting
47:36gas.
47:37But with Europe on the brink of war, the United States, the only country with helium supplies,
47:43refuses to sell the gas to Germany.
47:45And when war does break out, the Nazis cancel the airship program completely.
47:52But valuable lessons are learned from the disaster.
47:56Hydrogen has never been used again to lift passenger airships.
47:59Today, all airships are filled with helium.
48:03Directly after the Hindenburg crash, the Zeppelin company design a thunder car.
48:08This machine, located at their Frankfurt airfield, measures the electrical activity in the atmosphere.
48:15It's a breakthrough in collecting accurate data on thunderstorm conditions.
48:20And today, understanding of weather is at the forefront of all aviation safety.
48:27Nearly 70 years later, there are just two known remaining survivors from the tragedy.
48:33Cabin boy Werner France is now 83 years old.
48:37After the crash, he trained as an engineer.
48:39But the memories of that day stayed with him.
48:43It took quite some time to calm down again.
48:47Those impressions stayed with me for a long time.
48:51I did suffer from it for a long time.
48:53To have been confronted with this.
48:59Werner Doerner returned to Mexico with his family.
49:02Now age 75, he lives in the United States.
49:06Although he lost his father and sister, he believes the crash had a positive effect on him.
49:13I wonder what my life would have been without it.
49:17I was a spoiled brat.
49:19It made me probably a better person than what I would have been without it.
49:25The Hindenburg is still the largest flying machine ever built.
49:31Today's air travellers may fly across the Atlantic in a few hours.
49:34But the luxury and style the Hindenburg passengers experienced will probably never be surpassed.
49:52When in an answer to theary public told me about talent and time obviously on learning.
49:53Watanda, you know, in fish area.
49:54Bar0945.
49:57I've not been a saint or by the master.
49:59There's not aкомian from me to be too, but Arnoldohn are prepared to love for the airport.
50:00NASAalu.
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