Airship

An airship is a powered, steerable aircraft that stays aloft using the buoyancy of a lighter-than-air gas rather than wings, and comes in three main forms: rigid airships, often called Zeppelins, built around an internal structural framework; semi-rigid airships, with a partial supporting structure; and non-rigid airships, or blimps, which hold their shape entirely through internal gas pressure. Airships were the first aircraft capable of controlled, powered flight and were the dominant form of powered flight before the 1940s, reaching their peak in the 1930s, when German Zeppelins offered passenger service with amenities comparable to an ocean liner and competed directly with other long-distance transport. That golden age ended abruptly on 6 May 1937, when the hydrogen-filled Hindenburg caught fire and crashed while landing in New Jersey, killing 35 of the 97 people aboard; the widely filmed and broadcast disaster shattered public confidence in airship travel and brought passenger airship service to a definitive end.