LZ 25

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The Zeppelin LZ 25 was Count Zeppelin's 25th airship and the twelfth airship in the German Army .

history

The first run from LZ 25 took place on July 13, 1914. The army took over the airship under the military identification Z IX.

The zeppelin was still on test and acceptance runs when the First World War broke out. The brand new airship was relocated to Düsseldorf on August 10th for use at the front .

Z IX often made trips for reconnaissance and bombing raids to Antwerp and Calais together with the militarily converted passenger airship Sachsen stationed in Cologne . Z IX also served Ostend and Dunkirk . The Supreme Command was at that time not yet aware of the capabilities of the military airships and were about 21 August 1914 command to Z IX: "bombing through Antwerp, Zeebrugge , Dunkirk and Calais, return on Lille , where also The airship could easily cover the distance, but the maximum bomb load that the Z IX could carry was 1200 kg. So only ten bombs were intended for the five targets.

In September, Z IX also carried out further reconnaissance trips in western Belgium and in northern northern France.

The Anglo-French side now wanted to eliminate the danger posed by the airships. On September 27, 1914, an Allied aircraft attempted to destroy Z IX in its hall in Düsseldorf by dropping a bomb. As a result, machine guns were set up on the roofs of the airship halls in Düsseldorf and Cologne to ward off enemy planes.

End of LZ 25 / Z IX

On October 8, 1914, an aviator of the British Air Force surprised the air defense in the hall of LZ IX in Düsseldorf by diving into the airship hangar and was able to throw his two bombs into the airship hangar . The bombs killed a mechanic who was standing on the roof, the machine gunmen on the corner towers of the hall were unharmed. The bombs broke through the roof and set the zeppelin on fire. The bombs, which hung under the hull on either side, had no detonators, and when the metal of the suspension devices melted in the heat of the burning hydrogen gas, they fell to the ground without exploding. The airship was destroyed, only the engines attached to the outside of the ship could still be used. The hall also remained undamaged, with the exception of the hole in the roof.

Technical specifications

  • Carrying gas volume: 22,500 m³ hydrogen
  • Length: 158.0 m
  • Diameter: 14.90 m
  • Payload: 9.2 t
  • Drive: three Maybach engines, each 210 hp (154 kW)
  • Speed: 22.5 m / s (81 km / h)

See also

literature

  • Peter Meyer: Airships - The History of the German Zeppelins , Wehr & Wissen, Koblenz / Bonn 1980.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Ernst A. Lehmann : On air patrol and world travel. Wegweiser-Verlag, Berlin 1936, page 52
  2. ^ Ernst A. Lehmann : On air patrol and world travel. Wegweiser-Verlag, Berlin 1936, pages 52-53