VTOL Pilots

Jim swapping tips with Frank Robinson, founder of Robinson helicopters.

Hello Goodyear

Always a pleasure to see the Goodyear Blimp!

Tailgate Party

A little post-flight BBQ on the field.

Have tape, will measure

Matthew demonstrating the new camera mounting bracket and clearance.

Wheels Down, 5:12pm, Long Beach

Griffith Observatory

Reminds me of The Rocketeer...

Hollywood

Good to be back!

NBC Studios and Jay Leno Racetrack

The multi-color racetrack below is outside the studio where they film the Jay Leno show.

Santa Barbara

We just did a hover in place and 360 rotation to say hello to the tower and field at Santa Barbara. If all goes well, we'd like to try an operation here on a future SoCal trip. They have a wonderful Spanish Mission revival style main terminal and are right on the gorgeous coast.

Long Beach, here we come!

We're getting ready to head down to Long Beach for our fourth visit to LA of the year.

We'll be operating from the Long Beach airport, doing 1 hour flightseeing tours of Long Beach (Queen Mary, Sea Launch, Long Beach Harbor, Aquarium of the Pacific), 2 hour tours covering LA and Hollywood, 2 hour coastal tours down to San Clemente (we often get lucky and spot whales!), and for the first time -- romantic city light night flights to downtown LA and 30 minute "taste of zeppelin" tours (which internally I refer to as the "tease of zeppelin", as 30 minutes isn't nearly enough!)

If you are in the area, we're having an arrival party/cocktail hour at Ristorante da Vinci Weds evening. We'll have Chuck Henry of KNBC among our transit passengers, covering the awesome journey down some of the most amazing scenerey the California Coast has to offer. Our trip down is sold out, but we do have seats available on the northbound return trip next week.

Please come enjoy good company and witness her arrival this Wednesday (18th) from 4 – 7PM. Not only will you have the best view of the Zeppelin's landing from da Vinci's third-story balcony looking directly onto the airfield, you can enter to win a complimentary flight for two onboard the airship and meet the crew of the Eureka, who will join the party to mingle and answer questions once the ship has landed.

If you call Southern California home, we hope to see you this week!

Paper Airplanes

Paper Airplanes? Well, a paper aviation camera at least!

We started work a few weeks back on adding a camera mount to the ship. Once installed, we'll be able to act as a traffic 'copter, do movie/TV shoots, cover sports events, research marine mammals, or any of a thousand other cool things our stable platform will allow us to do.

Compared to other aerial platforms (primarily helicopters), we have amazing endurance (all day without refueling), lots of room in the gondola (so not only the camera operator can be on board, but also associated producers/researchers/etc), a restroom ('nuff said), and the ability to carry food and other supplies (useful for all day missions).

KRON4 Takes the Geek Tour

Gabriel Slate, the KRON4 Technology Reporter did his Tech Talk segment last week profiling our Silicon Valley Geek Tour aboard the Eureka. We had a great time checking out (among many other places) Apple at 1 Infinite Loop in Cupertino, the Emerald City of Oracle in Redwood Shores, Google HQ in Mountain View, and the linear accelerator at Stanford.

He even got a little "zep-head".

All in a days work for Gabriel. See the video below.

You can take your own Geek Tour, just click here.

Snoopy and the Red Baron

The Metlife Blimp is in town, and we caught these photos today from the Eureka.

Selling detergent (really..)

A few weeks ago, we were part of the props for a commercial for laundry detergent that is sold in Denmark (washing powder in English). The finished web movie is now online along with interviews with some of the actors. Two of them were shot with the airship so you can see that she still had the 23andMe branding on.

It doesn't help us tell people to buy tickets, but it certainly raises awareness! In case you were wondering, the real pilot in these sequences is Katharine Board, who had to supervise these guys all day on the airfield.

Bay Crossings - An "Air-Raising Experience"

We're on the cover of the November issue of Bay Crossings

They call it an "Air-Raising Experience".

Perhaps they got some zep-head?

Airship Ventures is a company that provides the opportunity to take a leisurely trip in a Zeppelin NT over the San Francisco Bay.

Searching for the Right Gift

Dennis Kane shared with us this home video of his search for the right birthday gift. His father, recently turned 90, was a B-17 pilot and never lost his love of flying. We're honored to have been able to have made this a very happy birthday for him!

Dad's 90th Birthday from dennis kane on Vimeo.

An Empty Bay Bridge

Something you don't see very often -- a very empty Bay Bridge.

Checking the Warp Core

From Chief Inspector Matthew Kilkerr:
"[During an inspection of] the main fitting between the aft landing gear and the internal structure ... to help double check ... we used Magnaflux Zyglo and black light."

And it ended up looking like something straight out of Star Trek™!

Eureka Shows Her Stuff

Just found this video of Eureka taken by a visitor to the recent San Francisco Fleet Week 2009 air show.

Pilots Jim, Kate and Hans-Paul had a great time coming up with our act.

Among the maneuvers you can see in this video:
- Approach and brake in place
- Rotate in place (at 0:30)
- "Waggle" (at 1:30)
- "Nose Dive" (at 2:05)

We hope everyone enjoyed it!

Bisecting a Runway

It doesn't happen every day, but often we get permission to fly over an airport. When we do, you end up with amazing photos like these -- watching a jet land right beneath you!

(Photos courtesy Michael Cierpka)

Foggy Sunday Morning

Ground Crew Chief Michael Cierpka sent us these fantastic shots of the ship coming out of the hangar into the fog this morning.

Great Moments in Text Messaging

As she flew over their practice field the other day, Eureka received a special text message from the Los Gatos High School Marching Band. Band members sprinted into formation to spell the word "HI."

Well done! What else can you do? Do you take requests? (Hint: marriage proposal formation freelancing!)



And, not to rain on their parade (yes, marching band pun), but check out this message, part of Nancy Regan's "Just Say No" campaign, circa 1988, performed right here in front of our building* at Moffett Field!


Image courtesy of Moffett Historical Museum.

* Check it out - we used to have a big blue awning in our main entryway!

Special Missions track

Today the airship is doing a 12 hour 'special mission', internally known as "operation velcro". Full details later this week!

Man the ropes

Hangar entry the manual way!

They let anyone on board these days...

A fireman, a man in a skimpy speedo, a captain, a construction worker covered in baby oil.....? If "Eureka" could blush, I'm sure she would have done.
Just one of the weird and wonderful things we end up doing on those blue 'special operations' days that you see on our flight calendar.

Practice, practice...

Rehearsing for Fleet Week this morning!

"That never happens in Flint."

Michael Moore was in San Francisco yesterday promoting his new movie "Capitalism: A love story" when "Eureka" flew over. The photographer of this great image, Eddie Codel, relayed that Michael said "That never happens in Flint" in reference to the Michigan city that is the HQ for General Motors and appears in many Michael Moore documentaries - presumably because it is his birthplace!

Anyway, we like to see that we can grab the attention of people who are used to grabbing all the attention themselves.

Airships and iPhones

Earlier this week, the Apple iPhone webpage posted a profile on Airship Ventures as a business that uses iPhones. There are some wonderful shots of "Eureka" as well as our operations.

You'll have to click on the link above to get to the video.

Enjoy!

Whale of a time...

Yesterday all the flights were amazed by the marine life we could see from the airship. Jim took this amazing close up picture of a blue whale with the shadow of the airship. Magical!

Buzzing the LA County Fair

Pilot Jim Dexter with his best Hollywood shades on

DFO and PIC Jim Dexter with his best Hollywood shades on.

Photo by Josh Ravetch

Awe Inspiring When Empty

We're debating if you could get 12 or 16 ships in here.

Reserved Parking

Wow, they must have known we were coming. AVI (Airship Ventures, Inc.) reserved parking!

Hello Tustin

Looks familiar!

We're doing a site survey today.

Accident!

Breakdown making the evening commute nasty.

KNX Traffic

Megan gets ready to report

The Intrepid Reporters of KNX 1070

Meghan Reyes (Traffic Reporter) and Ron Kilgore (Bureau Chief) of KNX1070 Radio pose after doing the first LA area live traffic report via Zeppelin.

Ron from KNX 1070 interviews Buzz

Ron from KNX 1070 interviews Buzz

Wheels Down, Long Beach

And sporting our new banner!

Over LAX

Nearly down! Got a 15kt tail wind.

Passing over LAX

Outflow

Diablo canyon power station

Morro Rock

Some amazing rocks around here. Buzz says that he's seen some pretty
amazing rocks too!!

Cayucos

Catching up with Stillman of the Red Zeppelin Winery who is waiting on
a pier to see us!

Men do use maps, really

Fritz double checks some restricted zones!

Video Postcards

Brian is using iChat video conferencing to show his mom Big Sur. "Hi
Mom!"

Mission Control

Multi-tasking comes easy when you've walked on the Moon.

Ocean view

Out over the Monterey bay!

Nearly at Santa cruz

Making good time. Jim is talking with Buzz in the cockpit.

Coincidences

Jim found this popular mechanics mag from July 1994 which has a
Zeppelin AND Buzz on the cover!

Wheels up!

Flying this morning with a real super hero - Buzz Aldrin!!

Headed South

The LA Transit flight is a Go for tomorrow. We will have a very very special guest aboard and will be blogging and tweeting as we go.

And we decided to put our own name on one side of the airship so that people know that they can actually buy a ticket to fly on us!

Look out for us on our travels tomorrow. We'll be Up Ship around 9am from Moffett. ETA in Long Beach probably between 4-6pm.

X marks the spot

The 23andMe chromosomes have been a wonderful visual for Eureka's hull. But all good things have an end....

Santa Cruz Flights

Last Saturday a group of us took Eureka to Santa Cruz to check out what would make the best routing for a new flight offering. We didn't blog it, mainly because Brian and I live in the Santa Cruz mountains and we were too busy looking for our house and familiar landmarks! However Wallace Baine from the Santa Cruz Sentinel was with us and he describes it better than I could. The sight of the boardwalk was amazing, and even though we had fog and some smoke, the views were tremendous. As Wallace said,

"This is the kind of flying that opens doors in your senses and gives you the thrill of seeing your place in the world -- your entire life even -- from the distance of insight. You're the flea finally seeing the dog."

Santa Cruz is a two hour adventure from Moffett Field.

Left Seat Laughter!

This week saw another successful pilot experience! Six intrepid private pilots spend half a day in ground school and half a day in the air, getting immersed in the whole flying experience and getting some stick time. Our next one is in Long Beach! Full details are here.

There are some great pictures from this past experience posted here from participant Richard A who is the guy in the left seat here.

Enjoy!

Wartime Blimps in "This Man's Navy"

"This Man's Navy", made over sixty years ago, depicts real Navy blimps in action. No CG here!

Wartime blimps were made by Goodyear, and the larger ships (K Class and M Class) carried depth charges, and .50 caliber machine guns. While a few blimps were shot down doing escort duty, they more than made up for it in their effectiveness in their role in anti-submarine-warfare. It has been said that no convoy escorted by a naval blimp lost a ship to enemy action. Much as a visible burglar alarm encourages those that would thieve to move on to easier targets, a convoy with a blimp overhead was too risky a target for an enemy submarine -- not so much because the blimp was armed, but because the blimp could call in the enemy location to a destroyer that would finish the job.

Enjoy this "best of" video produced by IncredibleWorldViews

And if you'd like the whole thing, you can find it over at Scooter Movies Shop on DVD.

Monterey Historic Races at Laguna Seca from the Air and Ground

Last weekend, Austin, Texas resident Tracy Anderson was in for a treat as he flew the airship from Moffett Field in Silicon Valley, over the Santa Cruz Mountains down to the Monterey Peninsula. There he saw the incredible Monterey Historic Races at Mazda Raceway Laguna Seca from both the sky and ground.

We captured some great footage of the trip over the mountains, the track from the air, and the historic vehicles on the ground. Talk about a "skybox"!

80th Anniversary of Graf Zeppelin in Japan

80 years ago, August 18-23, 1929, the Graf Zeppelin visited Tokyo, and our counterpart in Japan, Nippon Airship Corporation, is offering an anniversary flight today. Wish we were there!

We'll be raising a box of Nigori this evening to toast the event.

Laguna Seca

Above the clouds, headed for Laguna Seca

Above the clouds, headed for Laguna Seca...

Lexington Reservoir, Santa Cruz Mountains

We're headed south today thru Patchen Pass - the low point highway 17 crosses the Santa Cruz mountains between Los Gatos and Santa Cruz.