We all love airships, right? Those gargantuan, majestic sky sausages bopping over sprawling art deco metropolises. Long has the airship captured the imagination. Steampunk, gaslamp fantasy, and other retro-futuristic genres love their airships. Recently, I took a deep dive into dirigibles, and I’m here to share. This brief overview will highlight a few key points writers might enjoy for crafting realistic, sky-worthy ships.

***As with all of my work, no part of this was generated or researched using GenAI. Using Google AI or similar often leads to egregious errors. Looking up niche information like the skin of rigid airships easily yields bonkers results. This is your reminder to use citable sources. Some sources are listed at the end of this guide.

Airships are a massive topic. This can of worms leads straight into a hundred rabbit holes appeasing everyone from war buffs to ecopunks and everything in between. An airship can be anything from a balloon to the proud USS Akron. This guide will generally focus on rigid airships as opposed to blimps.

Airships are aerostat vessels, meaning they stay in the air using buoyancy or static lift. Large envelopes of gas or hot air (hot air balloon) provide the lift. The most common gases used to lift the airship are hydrogen and helium. Hydrogen is extremely flammable and led to the infamous Hindenburg disaster, wherein the 804ft ship caught fire and incinerated in less than 40 seconds.

You’re probably familiar with blimps, or non-rigid airships. Goodyear Blimp anyone? These are more or less giant balloons and rely on gas pressure to maintain their sleek sausage shape. Airships also come in semi-rigid design, which rely on gas pressure but also have some internal structure, and the rigid airship, often called a zeppelin, which houses internal gas bladders and a lightweight skeleton.   

The whole point of the lighter-than-air ship is that it doesn’t weigh anything. The massive amount of gas balances out cargo, crew, and the weight of the vessel herself, allowing her to float. To go up, the ship must drop some ballast (commonly sand or water). To go down, she must release buoyant gas.

If your characters are travelling by airship, this can be a cool detail to include, as their ship will only be able to go up and down so many times before needing to restock ballast and gas. So, say they moored somewhere and need to fly up to a higher elevation. If they didn’t refill the bladders, they may be forced to drop more than ballast to reach their goal, or not be able to reach it.

The airship doesn’t weigh anything. I’m not sure why this bit was so startling to me. Lighter-than-air ship, right? Imagine this 800 foot behemoth bopping around like a birthday balloon. Because these ships don’t weigh anything (when filled with gas), they need to be tethered when they dock. Don’t expect to simply drop anchor in a field and leave your boat for long-term storage. Any little breeze can send her spinning around like a windsock. Which is a hilarious image.

Which brings me to the mooring mast, a tower to which airships can drop anchor. If your world has airships, it probably has mooring masts. These towers are often mounted on train tracks designed to pull the vessel into the safety of a hangar when not in the sky. Historically, mooring masts could be found at airfields and aircraft carriers. There was talk of docking airships on skyscrapers like the Empire State Building, but it wasn’t to be. See above remark about spinning like a windsock and add crashing into other buildings.

Your airship is probably quiet! Aside from the engines (whatever type you choose) they’re far sneaker than say, airplanes. In real life, airships were used in bombing raids and spy missions. If you’re using more modern electric engine tech, they’ll be quieter still. Vintage airships used propellers driven by engines. The wooden 2 bladed propellers from the USS Akron were 16 feet across.

Your steampunk dirigible isn’t powered by steam (most likely). The Giffard dirigible from 1852 did use a 3 horsepower steam engine. Modern airships generally use electronic engines. The iconic LZ 129 Hindenburg’s engines were diesel (dieselpunk anyone?). Steam engines are heavy and impractical, even if they’re cool and on brand. So, unless your ship relies on magic to stay afloat, it probably doesn’t have a boiler.

Your airship is probably enormous. Do you know what 800 feet looks like? I sure didn’t. I absolutely suggest getting outside and figuring out just how long your ship is. If that’s not accessible to you, check out some size comparison charts. If you’re using a cruise-style ship in your story, chances are she’s a Biggy Big Boi. Hint: she’ll need an equally big hangar.

Basic anatomy. Like, super basic. The rigid airship consists of the torpedo (sausage lol) shape with the rudder and elevator fins in the back. The bridge/cabin is located under the sausage in the gondola. Large airships also have internal cabins, storage, and even catwalks. Engines are further back in the ship (likely with catwalk access). It’s appropriate to use nautical terminology such as fore, aft, starboard, port, bow, and so forth. The Akron had electric and telephone wiring, 110 fuel tanks, 44 water ballast bags, and 8 engine rooms.

The rigid skeleton of the ship is made from aluminum, composite, or other lightweight material. The skin of the ship can be anything from rubberized cotton to a super thin sheet-aluminum like the US Navy’s ZMC-2. The Hindenburg’s skin was cotton canvas ‘doped’ by a mixture of cellulose acetate butyrate and aluminum powder. This also made her shiny and metallic. And flammable.

Airships can be luxurious. Large airships could hold around 30-70 passengers in private cabins. There’s a lot of space up in that sausage hull. Interiors prioritized light weight materials but were still capable of swank. Once upon a time, folks dreamed of sky cruises. Different ships had different layouts, so if you’re including airship action in your work, I encourage you to look at models and cut-away diagrams of possible interiors. And have fun with it! Bonus: the Hindenburg served such meals as beef broth with marrow dumplings, Rhine salmon, and roast gosling.

Airships were used in warfare. They were used in both world wars as bombers, transport, and reconnaissance. The airship in warfare is another ouroboros of rabbit holes unsuited for the limited format of blogs or Threads, so please, go forth and fall in if you want to learn more! There’s so, so much to learn.

Modern airships. The majestic sky sausage (or in the case of HAV’s Airlander, majestic sky butt) are potentially making a comeback. Updated materials and electric propulsion make airships more practical and less dangerous. They show potential for cleaner air travel and disaster relief vessels. Check out the Pathfinder 1, Flying Whales, and of course the Airlander (please look at her I am BEGGING you).

So, what the hell is a Zeppelin? A zeppelin is a type of rigid airship named after the German inventor Ferdinand von Zeppelin. After their success, the word ‘zeppelin’ came to be synonymous with the rigid airship. I don’t personally use the word zeppelin in my secondary world fantasy because in those worlds there is no Germany or Ferdinand to name the ship after. The airship USS Los Angelas was built by the German company Luftschiffbau Zeppelin. Zeppelins are generally not made of led.

Here are some source suggestions for further research! First and foremost, search your local library for books. They’ll likely have quite an offering. Check out museums. I’m super fortunate to live within driving distance of Moffett Field, which offers the Moffett Field Museum and iconic Hangar 1. If you’d like a treat, try getting in contact with an air museum and asking if they know an airship specialist. There may be someone just waiting to tell you all about them.

Some cool books I’ve used: Airships by Robert Jackson, Balloons and Airships by Anthony Burton, The Hindenburg Explosion by Steven Otfinoski, When Giants Roamed the Sky by Dale A. Topping. I accessed these through the library system.