TECHNICAL COMMITTEES PRESENT THE YEAR IN REVIEW

ybrid Enterprises, exclusive reseller for test program under the direction of the Euro- Commercial HLockheed Martin’s 20-ton capacity hy- pean Aviation Safety Agency. Airlander 10 is brid airship, LMH-1, announced at the June scheduled to fly in the first half of 2016. hybrid airships Paris Air Show that it would start taking or- In August, Zeppelin Luftschifftechnik prepare to get ders for delivery as early as 2018. Lockheed GmbH celebrated carrying its 200,000th Zep- said it has completed all required FAA certi- pelin NT passenger. In the U.S., Goodyear is airborne fication planning steps and is ready to begin assembling the second of three NT Zeppelins construction of the first commercial model at it ordered in 2001. The craft’s first flight is by Alan Farnham its Palmdale, California, facility. scheduled for spring 2016. The Lighter-Than-Air-Systems Russia’s Augur RosAeroSystems, makers At Aeros Corp. in Los Angeles, design, test- Technical Committee of the AU-30 blimp (payload 1/2 ton) intends ing and other development work continues stimulates development of to complete the first phase of development on the ML866 (66-ton payload) Aeroscraft. knowledge related to airships of its hybrid cargo-and-passenger airship — The craft uses a recently patented proprietary and aerostats for use Atlant-30 (capacity 16 tons) — by December, buoyancy-control system that allows for vertical in a host of applications with tests of a prototype to follow. A larger takeoff or landing at maximum payload with- from transportation to surveillance. version, Atlant-100, would carry 60 tons. out using external ballast. In March the com- TCOM and Logos Technologies demon- pany sued the U.S. Navy for damage sustained strated the capabilities of Logos’ Simera wide by its Dragon Dream prototype, when the roof area motion imagery sensor combined with a of a Navy-owned hangar partially collapsed. TCOM 12M Tactical Aerostat. Targets of inter- Airship do Brasil, a Brazilian manufac- est were located and tracked in real time over turer of blimps, balloons and other lighter- a city-sized area, from the system’s 360-de- than-air technology, has made its long-term gree field of view. In October a TCOM aero- priority the development of a “classical con- stat, part of Raytheon’s JLENS missile defense system, broke free from its moorings at the Aberdeen Proving Ground and drifted some 150 miles before coming down in rural The Airlander 10 hybrid Pennsylvania. The program airship being air-inflated at Hybrid Air Vehicles’ Cardington has been suspended, pending Hangar in the U.K. Army review. This year, Goodyear cel- ebrated 90 years of using air- ships for advertising, including 60 years of aerial broadcast- ing. In August, Goodyear re- tired its GZ-20 blimp, Spirit of America, based in Carson, California, which has carried 30,280 passengers on 8,005 flights since 2002. It will be re- Hybrid Air Vehicles placed first by its twin sister, Spirit of Innovation, followed two years later by one of Goodyear’s new cept” airship of 30-ton capacity, the ADB Zeppelin NT semi-rigids. 3-30. Applications would include the inspec- The U.K.’s Hybrid Air Vehicles (HAV) tion, maintenance and replacement of electric continued to reassemble its 92-meter-long transmission lines in the Amazon. In March Airlander 10 hybrid airship at its Cardington the company inaugurated a new headquar- Hangar in England. The craft was formerly ters in São Carlos, including a new hangar. part of the U.S. Army’s Long Endurance It plans to have an intermediary airship, the Multi-Intelligence Vehicle program, and has 50-meter long ADB 3-3 non-rigid, flying in the now been reclassified as a civil aircraft. In first quarter of 2016. 2015 HAV raised money to return it to fly- In March, U.S. Reps. Tom Rooney (R- ing condition, the funds coming from a va- Florida) and Brad Sherman (D-California) an- riety of sources, including $3.4 million from nounced formation of a bipartisan Cargo Air- crowdfunding. The company’s workforce has ship Congressional Caucus to promote cargo increased to 90 as it prepares for a civil flight airships for commercial and military use.

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