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I never fail to be bewildered with the Zeppelins. Apart from the arduous and boring journey - how did the passengers rest - I don't see pics of any rooms or beds - how did they sleep at all?

Transatlantic flights could take more than 100 hours (for example, the final flight left Frankfurt on the evening of 3 May 1937, and arrived late in the evening of 6 May). How on earth could they stock up on food for so many days?

sempaiscuba
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killjoy
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    "I don't see pics of any rooms or beds" -- how much did you look? They aren't particularly hard to find. A simple Google image search of "Hindenburg cabins" (or even "Hindenburg beds" or "Zeppelin rooms") works in seconds. – John Coleman Sep 27 '17 at 11:10
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    arduous and boring journey – What makes you think so? You could freely move in a Zeppelin, and partake in activities like conversations, reading, and writing. I consider this much more comfortable and less time-wasting than a plane flight, not to mention a car drive. – Wrzlprmft Sep 27 '17 at 11:22
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    Floating gently through the sky does not meet my threshold for "arduous journey". – Nuclear Hoagie Sep 27 '17 at 12:35
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    @Wrzlprmft Probably rather more restrictive and less comfortable than crossing the Atlantic on board a luxury liner though - which would have been the alternative. – sempaiscuba Sep 27 '17 at 12:40
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    @sempaiscuba - I understand the ride was far smoother than riding in an airplane and the North Atlantic isn't exactly known to be smooth sailing for ship. – T.E.D. Sep 27 '17 at 15:08
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    On top, a ship took way longer. – TomTom Sep 27 '17 at 15:51
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    "So many days"? You realize that's 100 hours, only 4 days, right? – Kevin Sep 27 '17 at 21:51
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    I love the comparisons of the Graf Zeppelin cockpit with a Boeing 747 cockpit. Plenty of spare room for food storage there ;) – TessellatingHeckler Sep 28 '17 at 00:20
  • My initial searches just landed with images of the external of t he blimp rather that interiors. Only when specifically searching for interiors do we get to see the innards. After I lazily posted my question I did come across some pics of rooms. So the question was based on that - lack of space to move around - but I knew I would get some great concise answers here. – killjoy Sep 28 '17 at 09:47
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    Cruise ships take people on tours that are on average 5 times longer. How do they manage?! – Agent_L Sep 28 '17 at 10:18
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    Come to Friedrichshafen on Lake Constance in South Germany. We still build Zeppelins here. You can visit the large and excellent Zeppelin museum, where you can see all about building, flying and riding in Zeppis. The museum contains many exhibits about the insides of them and how passengers travelled. If you book in advance you can ride in a new generation Zeppi. www.zeppelin-museum.de – RedSonja Sep 28 '17 at 11:00
  • @RedSonja: How does the new Zeppi compare with the new helium airship (I think from UK) ...while I am terrified of flying in a hot-air balloon, I will need quite a few tequila shots before I jump on a Zep :)...edit: ok that site was all double dutch to me (even tho' I did German in skule!) – killjoy Sep 28 '17 at 20:00
  • @killjoy sorry I know nothing about English airships. I have been in the Zeppi. Nowadays passengers travel in a gondola hung underneath. You have to take turns getting on and off so it doesn't float away. If you come to the Zep Museum they do tours in English. I shall ask them to anglify the website. – RedSonja Sep 29 '17 at 05:04

3 Answers3

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The Hindenburg was originally built with 25 double-berthed cabins which accommodated up to 50 passengers. While the ship was laid up in Frankfurt during the winter of 1936-1937, 9 more cabins were added, accommodating an additional 20 passengers. The capacity was then 70 fare-paying passengers.

The arrangement of cabins on the Hindenburg in 1936 is shown here:

Hindenburg cabins - source: Wikipedia

The crew accommodation was more limited. The Hindenburg carried about 50-60 crew members (it varied from 47 on its maiden flight to 61 on its final flight). The commander had a private cabin just forward of the control car. Other officers shared a compartment with twelve bunks in the same area, while the remaining crew shared 2 crew areas, one with 22 bunks just aft of the passenger accommodation and another with twelve bunks closer to the stern.

100 hours is just over 4 days. Storage for food etc. to feed 120-130 people for four days would really not be a problem on an airship the size of the Hindenburg.

There are a number of websites with cutaway diagrams of the Hindenburg (and other Zeppelins), including the one on airships.net. These give a good idea of how storage and cabin space were distributed.

sempaiscuba
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    what a heck of a way to travel! i wonder how things like hot water for showers was, etc. I know that even with the hydrogen gas, they had a specially designed smoking cabin, so the paid attention to comfort. – Jeff Sep 26 '17 at 23:27
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    I looked it up: Hindenburg had only one shower for the whole ship and two bathrooms. This was probably not considered that bad in those days but pretty inconvenient even then. Similar to trains, I guess where I understand even luxury trains do not tend to have private baths. – Jeff Sep 26 '17 at 23:40
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    @vsz: I would say some luxury trains have private baths -- the Orient Express, last time I checked, did not. But the main thing is, the Hindenburg sure did not. – Jeff Sep 27 '17 at 13:17
  • Did they add more crew bunks when the size went from 47 to 61, or did some of the crew end up having to hot bunk? – Dan Is Fiddling By Firelight Sep 27 '17 at 15:07
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    @DanNeely I've not seen anything to say they added more crew quarters. I assume they "hot bunked". Mind you, I've read that crew often used to "hot bunk" on ocean crossings as well. – sempaiscuba Sep 27 '17 at 16:06
  • That drawing appears to have vehicles in there. How did that work? – hatchet - done with SOverflow Sep 27 '17 at 17:24
  • @hatchet I think they are meant to be crew/cargo areas on the forward keel – sempaiscuba Sep 27 '17 at 18:00
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    @sempaiscuba - after looking at that, and browsing killjoy's link, it seems they did sling some vehicles in there (from page on cargo area. I was rather surprised by that. – hatchet - done with SOverflow Sep 27 '17 at 18:54
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    "Storage for food etc. to feed 120-130 people for four days would really not be a problem on an airship the size of the Hindenburg." - not for space, nor due to weight; the Graf Zeppelin had a usable lift capacity of ~60,000 lbs, and carried 17,600 lbs of water as ballast, 5,000 lbs as emergency ballast, 3,500lbs of water as drinking cooking and washing supply - IIRC there was no aircraft on the planet which could approach the heavy lift capability of the big airships at that time. – TessellatingHeckler Sep 28 '17 at 00:37
  • Where did their waste go? Did they just drop it in the ocean? – kristianp Sep 28 '17 at 02:10
  • The cutaway with its "hermetic roof to exclude hydrogen" invites a question about how the people inside were able to breathe for the duration. Was the entire passenger/crew area completely enclosed? If so, did they bring along tanks of O2 to ensure that people didn't asphyxiate mid-voyage? Or was there some mechanism to bring in fresh air from outside? – aroth Sep 28 '17 at 12:56
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    @aroth The Hindenburgs normal cruising altitude was only 200m, presumably the passenger/crew area was unpressurized and just had outside air intake/exhaust ports. – Dan Is Fiddling By Firelight Sep 28 '17 at 14:07
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    @Jeff It's surprising how hard it was to ignite the hydrogen in these things. In World War I British fighters had alternating phosphorous rounds and there was still no guarantee that the H2 would ignite when hit directly. No one really knows for sure why the Hindenburg burned so catastrophically. The most likely culprit is the shell caught fire and only after that did the hydrogen contribute to the disaster (if memory serves me). – JimmyJames Sep 28 '17 at 14:54
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    @TessellatingHeckler while those airships did have great lift capability, weight was by no means a non-issue but very much a limiting factor on passenger capacity. Food is light, but water is not – certainly not in the quantities that modern Westerners are accustomed to running it down the drain... – leftaroundabout Sep 28 '17 at 16:40
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    @JimmyJames, there was actually a "Mythbusters" episode on this. They looked at the film footage, they looked into the paint and materials used, and they hypothesized that the builders inadvertently built the Hindenburg out of something very similar to thermite. – John R. Strohm Sep 29 '17 at 15:55
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    @JohnR.Strohm There was a Nova special where they presented a number of theories in detail. I've seen the Myth Busters make some really silly logical errors. I don't have a ton of confidence in them. – JimmyJames Sep 29 '17 at 16:32
  • Does anyone know why they needed 40-60 crew members in the first place? – vsz Sep 29 '17 at 22:04
  • @vsz, there was a great deal of manual labor involved in flying an airship. You've got four mechanics, one on each engine. You've got a roving engineer and rigger to deal with mechanical problems. Up in the control car, you've got the rudder man, the elevator man, the navigator, the radioman, and the officer of the watch. Multiply by three shifts for 33 shift crew, add in the captain, chief engineer, chief rigger, chief radio officer, and three non-shift electricians, and you've got 40 crew before factoring in the people who deal with the passengers. – Mark Aug 21 '19 at 04:11
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Never look at history with your own 'modern' perceptions! In those days there were only 2 ways to cross the Atlantic: by ship or by zeppelin. A ship took longer than a zeppelin. Everybody crossed by ship. The zeppelin was as new as space travel now is, so the rich and famous preferred it. If only to show off they could afford it. Boring? Today 4 days seems a bit lengthy without games/movies/ipad/phone. Back then those things didn't exist, so nobody missed them. People read books, talked and kept themselves busy.

Zeppelins could and can carry fairly heavy loads. Stocking up on food wasn't a problem. If I recall correctly, there was even a piano on board! A special light weight version, but still. Passengers enjoyed luxurious accommodation. The crew, not so much. That was completely normal back then.

Luxurious accommodation for that time, that is. In 1900 President Paul Kruger stayed in Hotel Des Indes, in The Hague (NL), which is a 5 star hotel. He didn't have a private bathroom. The whole floor (all 5 star suites!) shared the same bathroom at the end of the corridor! Taking a shower at least once daily is a fairly new custom. As a kid in the sixties we normally showered once or perhaps twice per week. (Paul Kruger was president of Transvaal. During the Boer war he was evacuated to Europe.)

Jos
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Seems there were a lot of rooms, so food stock shouldnt be an issue.

The interior spaces on the Hindenburg were divided into three main areas:

  • Passenger Decks
  • Control Car
  • Crew Areas

from http://www.airships.net/hindenburg/interiors/

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