The Airship Prize

Economic development in Northern Canada is constrained by the cost of transportation and logistics.  The limited transportation options available increase the direct costs of shipping and add to the indirect costs of inventories. Concerns about climate change impacts, delays in environmental approvals and uncertainty regarding First Nations land claims further increase investment risk. As a result, the transportation solution offered by airships is gathering increased interest in northern Canada. (more…)

Residents of Caribou, Maine, who happened to glance up at the skies over the former Loring Air Force Base recently got a glimpse of the future—although they might have thought they were looking at something out of the past. Engineers from my company, Science Applications International Corp. (SAIC), in McLean, Va., have been conducting test flights of a new type of lighter-than-air vehicle. Link to article on IEEE Spectrum

From FlightGlobal: “A 15.2m (50ft)-long prototype for a 95m airship has now been flown 22 times and its developer Hybrid Air Vehicles has submitted bids for US military contracts, including the Long Endurance Multi-INT Vehicle (LEMV) programme for the US Army.” Hybrid Airship Vehicles – Prototype hybrid airship flies