Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

CTOnews.com, October 26 (Xinhua)-- Google co-founder Sergey Brin founded a company called LTA Research in 2015 to develop airships for humanitarian and cargo transportation, IEEE Spectrum reported. The company received a special airworthiness certificate from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) in early September to begin test flights of its helium airship Pathfinder 1, the largest since the Hiddenburg in the 1930s, at Moffet United Airport (Moffett Field) in Silicon Valley, California.

Pathfinder 1 is 124m long and consists of 96 welded titanium alloy joints and 288 carbon fiber reinforced polymer tubes in a rigid design. It uses non-flammable helium as a lift gas, rather than explosive hydrogen, as previous airships did. The airship is also equipped with 12 electric motors distributed on both sides and tail of the airship and four tail rudders, which can achieve vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) and a maximum speed of about 120km / h. The airship is covered with a tough layer of Tedlar material and 13 helium bags inside, each with a lidar system to monitor gas levels.

The Pathfinder 1 uses a hybrid propulsion system powered by two 150kW diesel generators and 24 batteries. Alan Weston, CEO of LTA, said in a recent speech that LTA plans to use hydrogen as fuel for future fuel cells or turbine generators, and possibly even as lift gas, in subsequent versions of the airship.

Pathfinder 1's flight test plan includes a large number of indoor and outdoor ground tests and a gradual expansion of the flight envelope. The airship can fly within the airspace of Moffet Union Airport and nearby Palo Alto Airport (Palo Alto airport) at an altitude of no more than 460m, thus avoiding interference with commercial flights at San Jose International Airport (San Jose International airport) and San Francisco International Airport (San Francisco International airport).

LTA said it had obtained a certificate of airworthiness, but did not provide further details. Although the Pathfinder 1 is designed to drive alone, there will be a second pilot in the initial flight test phase. The airship uses a cockpit designed by the famous German company Zeppelin company, which can hold up to 14 people, but is not allowed to carry extra passengers during the test.

After extensive flight tests in California, Pathfinder 1 will be transferred to the former Goodyear Airship Plant (Goodyear Airdock) airship hangar in Akron, Ohio, which has been acquired by LTA as its future manufacturing site. There, a larger 180m airship Pathfinder 3 is already under development.

LTA eventually intends to use its airships for humanitarian missions to transport goods and people to areas where traffic is not accessible. CTOnews.com noted that Brin also runs a non-profit organization called Global support and Development (Global Support and Development), which has carried out similar missions in the Caribbean, Latin America and the South Pacific by sea. The group initially used Brin's own superyacht to transport medical personnel to the scene of hurricanes and other disasters and recently launched a specially built ship capable of carrying dozens of medical personnel and standard containers.

Pathfinder 1's airworthiness certificate is valid for one year, but LTA said in its application letter that it expected the test plan to be completed within 180 days.

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