The Hindenburg :: American America History

The HindenburgThe InfernoThe arrival of the Hindenburg, thirteen hours behind schedule, at Lakehurst, saucy Jersey, on the evening of May 6, 1937, promised to be r outine. The ship had an unblemished gum elastic record on eighteen previous Atlantic crossings. In fact, no passenger had ever lost his life on any commercialized airship. Still, because this was the beginning of the most ambitious season yet for airship voyages, reporters, photographers and word reel cameramen had their eyes and lenses focused on the great dirigible as it approached. When disaster struck it was sudden. Without warning flames gushed from within the Hindenburgs hull thirty-two seconds subsequently the airship lay on the ground, ravaged. Never had the sights and sounds of a disaster in progress been so graphically documented. Within a day, newspaper readers and field of view audiences were confronted by fiery images of the Hindenburg. Radio listeners heard the emotional words of reporter Herb Morrison, sobbing into his recorder, Its burning, bursting into flames, and its falling on the mooring mast and all the folks. This is ane of the worst catastrophes in the world. . . . Oh, the humanity and all the passengers(Marben 58) When this floating cathedral, called the Hindenburg, burst into a geyser of flaming hydrogen there was a tremendous collision on the public, although two thirds of the people on board survived. Two theories closely why it happened surfaced and this tragedy put an end to the short age of these abundant airships.The demise of the Hindenburg had a searing impact on public consciousness that out-of-the- federal agency(prenominal) surpassed the plunder statistics of the calamity. Men and women escaped, even from this inferno. One elderly lady walked out by the normal exit as though nothing had happened and was unscratched. A fourteen-year-old cabin boy leapinged to the ground into flames and smoke. He was almost unconscious from the fumes when a water-balla st bag collapsed over his head. He got out. One passenger hacked his way through a jungle of hot metal using his bare hands. Another emerged safely, only to have another passenger land upon him and weaken him. One man, at an open window with every chance to jump to safety, went back into the flames to his wife, both died. The final count was 36 dead, including 13 passengers. to the highest degree two thirds, of the 97 persons on board survived, but that fact was perpetually obscured, and the name Hindenburg became comparable only to the name Titanic(Abbott 69).