Nobody could ever accuse 21^st Century Airships, Inc. in Newmarket, Ontario, Canada of not thinking big.

The company has just completed a 10-day trial program for a two-person piloted one-of-a-kind airship.

The soccer ball-looking vehicle is 62-feet (19-meters) in diameter and powered by four engines. What’s more it is just a prototype for an even larger airship now being built.

That mega-craft will stand 13-stories high, some 40-meters in diameter. The big whopper of a vehicle is destination driven, that is it will be used to attempt an un-refueled, non-stop, around-the-world flight. Once airborne, the piloted flight – slated for late 2006 – is estimated to take two weeks and cover 28,000 miles (45,000 kilometers).

Next year’s flight is aimed at making the longest recorded flight, for any aircraft, in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The spherical type of airship has been developed and patented by 21^st Century Airships Inc., as a multi-use platform. Such tasks as advertising to high altitude military surveillance and communications purposes can be assigned duties for the large airship. 

According to the company, earlier prototypes have already reached higher altitudes than any of today’s traditional cigar-shaped blimps and hold current altitude world records for airships. They are also the world’s only amphibious airships, capable of landing and taking-off from water.

-- Leonard David

Credit: 21^st Century Airships, Inc.