Showing posts with label hindenburg. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hindenburg. Show all posts

Friday, May 25, 2012

Look to the skies! The Hindenburg over Newfoundland - a research project



Dirigible over Brigus [1935], PANL VA 6-87

From 1936 to 1937, the German dirigible, LZ 129 Hindenburg made 14 flights over Newfoundland. Researchers at Memorial University are trying to recount and record these trips and are looking for first and second hand stories of the Hindenburg flying over Newfoundland and Labrador. Documents show that the Hindenburg was spotted over Brigus, CBS, Corner Brook, Cupids, Fortune, Lamaline, North West River, Pouch Cove, St. Anthony, St. John’s and Stephenville.

If you or someone you know remembers the Hindenburg passing overhead, have heard stories of it, know of other communities where it was spotted, or have pictures, please email historicaviation@gmail.com so that this amazing piece of Newfoundland history can be recorded and saved.

"This video might also be of interest to you," notes archaeologist Lisa Daly. "It's taken near Cape Race on the final flight of the airship."


Hindenburg survivor, German journalist Leonhard Adelt, wrote:

"On the third day we sighted Newfoundland. Binoculars and cameras appeared, and my wife’s delight grew when the white dots along the coast turned out to be icebergs. The captain ordered the ship to fly low and steer toward them. Very slowly we passed over the most beautiful, which looked like a magic marble statue. The sun came out and laid a double rainbow around the airship. The giant iceberg turned into a monument of sparkling brilliance. We glimpsed the foothills, the lighthouse on Cape Race, the limitless forests of the hinterland. Then the coast sprang back and we floated, a gray object in a gray mist, over the invisible sea."

And, if you haven't seen it, check out this original footage from the British Pathe archive. It shows impressive shots of the Hindenburg flying over its landing ground at Lakehurst, New Jersey, and then  footage of the famous crash.  View it on YouTube here.