Word: ballast
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Dates: during 1930-1939
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Lieut.-Commander Herbert V.Wiley, came on duty at midnight he changed the course to west. A half hour later the great ship plunged from its 1,600 ft. altitude. The commander reached for a row of pullcords overhead, yanked at them to release water ballast. Slowly, painfully, the shuddering Akron shouldered her way aloft again. An "all hands on" brought the off-watch from their bunks. Officers, bos'ns' mates, riggers, firemen groped their way along narrow catwalks to their stations...
...Detroit, three officials of Stinson Aircraft Corp. flew a new type Stinson tri-motor. The three were Chief Engineer Arthur Saxon, 29, who had been eight years with Stinson, helped design its first plane; his assistant, Samuel Benson; and Chief Test Pilot Owen Pinaire. With two tons of lead ballast in the cabin, they wanted to try the plane's stability...
...mile west of the airport, 800 ft. aloft, the big ship went into a spin, crashed into a grove of trees. Engineer, assistant, test-pilot, all were killed. To their graves they took the secret of the crash. Best guess: sudden shifting of the bags of lead ballast...
Boston's Dr. John Jeffries, with Jean-Pierre Francois Blanchard in 1785, was first to cross the English Channel in a balloon. Struggling to keep the bag aloft, they cast out successively sand ballast, wings, ornaments, all scientific apparatus (except the barometer), biscuits, apples, oars, moulinet, anchors, cords, finally their outer garments...
...only control the pilot has over his balloon is up & down. He valves gas to descend, drops ballast to rise. His skill is measured by his judgment of weather conditions and his ability to find favoring winds with the least use of his two tools, gas and ballast. A U. S. team won the 1913 Bennett race from Paris when, instead of grounding before they reached the Atlantic as did all other balloons, they continued out to sea, knowing they would strike a wind that would carry them northeast to England. This year all gas bags carried radios to receive...