HOSPITAL AIRSHIPS
The idea is simple, use airships to carry humanitarian relief to disaster victims around the world. Because airships are so large, they can be built as "flying hospitals"...with emergency surgery rooms and medical equipment. The airships can carry large amounts of supplies....food, water purification systems, medical supplies.....and doctors, nurses, and emergency search and rescue personnel on board.

Instead of flying to a major airport at a large city where supplies would have to be loaded onto trucks or helicopters to carry disaster relief, airship can fly directly to any location on earth and deliver humanitarian aid quickly to the exact place it is needed. Airships can deliver help to the most remote locations, even if roads are destroyed as in an earthquake, or flooding.

By carrying materials and medical or rescue personnel directly to the area where it is needed, airships can avoid many of the political or potentialy hazardous barriers that often delay help from being delivered rapidly to disaster victims.

Because airships can fly and operate on solar power, they are less expensive to operate than other means used to deliver humanitarian aid; this makes airships a new and better way to reach disaster areas.

Turtle Airships is eager to develop airships for humanitarian work; we desire to make airships available to the United Nations; International Red Cross; Red Crescent; and other non-profit humanitarian organizations.

Contact: turtleairships@hotmail.com

Each time I hear someone speak about a helium shortage, I am curious if they speak of only the historic U.S. reserves? indeed, they are dwindling.

However, large reserves are coming online in Russia and Qataar, with lesser amounts available in India and Timor........Turtle Airships is focused on utilizing these new sources, as well as those older ones in Algeria and Poland.

There is sufficient helium for some time. However, we also intend to manufacture and use Ammonia as a lifting gas, and to develop gradual use and acceptance of hydrogen for some applications.

As was intended in the old Soviet "Thermoplane" design, there is always the possibility of employing hot air as a partial component of an airship design.

Worldwide airline industry spends over $100 Billion on jet fuel, each year. Each $1 increase in the cost of crude oil, means another $ Billion in jet fuel. At the moment, crude is at $115/barrel......from below $80 less than six months ago.

Time to invest in SOLAR POWER flight!

In my book "HELIUM PHOENIX"; a chapter deals with the military use of Turtle Airships in transport and offensive roles. The writing details the stealth capabilities of airships, their huge cargo capabilities, survivability in a hostile combat environment, etc.

In 2001, this portion of my book was circulated within the Pentagon by a former head of the military's then new stealth programs. This gave at least some encouragement to the Pentagon to begin an airship program; which became the DARPA "Walrus" project.

MILITARY TRANSPORT: Airships can carry bulkier and heavier payloads than any airplane. Airships require extremely little fuel, can fly for weeks without refueling, use simple diesel engines. Airships can fly using nothing but solar power, fuel cells, batteries. Military transport by airship can eliminate the huge aerial tanker needs of current airlift methods.

Airships can operate without airports; can carry troops or material to front line, hot combat landing zones, directly. An airship can land in a simple field, it does not even need to be "prepared" by clearing it as a rough landing strip.

STEALTH: Airships can be constructed entirely out of plastics, carbon fiber materials and other materials that absorb all radar; they can be formed to any shape; they do not need to retain aerodynamic shapes.....they can thus be MORE stealthy than current B-2 bombers.

Because engines can be buried within hundreds of feet due to the large size of airships.....there is no infrared signature. Flying at less than 250mph, there is not even a noticable infrared signature given from the friction of moving through the air, such as is found on rotor blades or fixed wings at higher speeds.

Airships can fly without engines running at all....there is no acoustic signature.

Because airships can land VTOL into any field, (or, as amphibians, any body of water), they can simply land to avoid search; appearing as nothing more than a hill. Airships can actually be covered with all manner of physical camoflage, without affecting their flight abilities....nets, fake snow, even fake vegetation as elaborate as shrub and small trees.

SURVIVABILITY: You can't hit what you cant find. The airships ability to be stealthy reduces most common hostile fire threats to almost zero. Any missile that relies upon radar or infra red to locate it's target is virtualy useless. A "hit" from a missile is not enough to kill the airship. Unlike an airplane, the airship used helium for lift; a missile strike cannot be damaging enough to the multiple helium cells to cause the airship to crash. likewise, airships are fairly impervious to damage caused by ground fire; it takes huge amounts of hits to cause enough leakage to stop the airship from flying. Even with thousands of holes caused by ground fire, the simple volume of helium is so large that a damaged airship can fly on for hundreds of miles. Airships can carry offensive weapons, and defensive weapons. An airship can act as its own ground fire supression platform; designed to act just as a current gunship.

Contact:

turtleairships@hotmail.com

build a SHIP.
make it fly.
change the world.

The greatest challenge faced in the airship industry is not technology; it is the public perception of airships as a whole. As long as airships are constructed in a manner that requires that they be "inflated", the public will rightfully see them as no more than novelty elongated balloons; and the airship industry will continue in its' moribund state. It must be changed.

Stop building blimps. Do not build zeppelins. Build SHIPS that FLY.

Why "turtle"?

Because it has a SHELL. A hard, facted, durable, all weather, strong shell. Unlike blimps or zeppelins; which are built as glorified balloons...which can leak and tear and fall apart in sunlight.

Because it is FAST. The incrongruity of a fast Turtle is meant to surprise and intrique. Blimps and zeppelins are slow because of the flexibility and lack of structural strength of their fabric and laminate envelopes. The Turtle shell makes it strong, rigid......and fast. To 200mph.........

Because it is AMPHIBIOUS. Blimps and zeppelins land and tie up at mooring masts. They need large ground crews to land. The Turtle airship, on the other hand, can land anywhere. It can land on an unprepared field, or land in the water.........just like a turtle.

Because it looks like a turtle. The bow and stern planes give the impression of a turtles' four legs sticking out from its' shell. The position of the three bottom hulls appears much like a turtles' head and forelimbs underneath its' shell.

Because its' "slow, but sure". At one third the speed of a large jet......it is safe and steady. No turbulence. No banking or climbing like an airplane. Quiet. Calm. No jet lag. Comfortable........with walk around room and private staterooms. Totaly safe. No high speed make-or-break approaches to runway landings. No wind shear dangers. Immune to the same bombing, shooting, missiles, or hi-jack attempts that threaten airplanes.

Because it's SOLAR POWERED. Just as a cold blooded turtle climbs out of the water and soaks up the sun.........so Turtle Airships collect sunlight in photovoltaic solar cells in order to generate electricity for power. With fuel cells and a bio-diesel back up capability, it makes the Turtle airship into a truly "green" technology; and changes flight forever.

Because who could ignore, or ever forget......A FLYING TURTLE ??!!

SOLAR POWER AIRSHIPS

In the last two days, as oil prices close in on $100/barrel.....I have noticed two different news stories concerning the latest fuel costs incurred by the airline industry. First one noted that for each $1 per barrel increase in the price of oil, aviation fuels cost the airline industry another $470 Million each year. Half a Billion dollars. Fun!

Second news story indicated that major airlines were moving towards "parking" large numbers of aircraft instead of flying them; and, that investigations were being made that some airlines have been flying airplanes underfueled in order to save weight.......a potentially very serious safety issue.

I also recently read information indicating that the idea of using airships is beginning to catch on....as they were a potential "green" technology.

Can airships use Bio-Diesel? ABSOLUTELY!

All blimps and zeppelins now use engines that are expressly made for airplanes..and aviation gas. But, change back to simple diesel engines, like those that were successfully used in the first four decades of airship development.........and modern airships can indeed use bio-fuels like Ethanol or Bio-Diesel.