Rose Bowl

Here is where it will happen. Wisconsin vs. TCU. We'll be providing aerial video coverage.Watch for Eureka above during the game.

Saving their spot

Crowds are already taking their places a day early for the Tournament of Roses parade tomorrow!

At last!

The storms in California finally abated so today, "Eureka" gets to come out of the dark hangar and fly. It's a beautiful sunny day with a blue sky and our girl looks fabulous cruising around up there! Be sure to wave if you spot her.

Modern Marvels Driver's Seat

Eureka makes her debut appearance on the History Channel's "Modern Marvels" show tonight, December 21 at 8pm/7 Central...

From history.com:

Get behind the wheel and take control of the some of the largest, fastest, most powerful machines on the planet. These aren't your average vehicles--and handling one of these rides is unlike anything else. But you need more than just a learner's permit to take control of these vehicles...you need training, experience, and above all, guts--if you plan to sit in the Driver's Seat.

Follow this link to see our earlier post the day of filming (September 18) with the film crew getting Zepp Head...

Warming wallpaper?

Pilot Jim Dexter took this amazing image of the Zeppelin shadow over the Bay Area salt ponds. Click the image for the high resolution - you can see a flock of birds and their shadows too! We think it would make a great desktop computer wallpaper, with the rich red color (caused by the microorganisms in the salt pond) helping to cheer and warm you up in this chilly winter weather.

Santa's Sacks?

As our Director of Maintenance, Matthew, points out, most people are waiting for their stockings to be filled at this time of year. Not him, he's working on filling our new ballast bags with lead shot!

Northwest Tour Special Mission 2012

After our Northwest Tour though Oregon to Seattle, Washington earlier this year, a request came in to us asking if we could use infra-red imaging to detect "large mammals" in the forested regions of the Pacific Northwest.

Well, of course we could.

Here is our whimsical take on what such a mission could look like.

Enjoy!

Poster Art at Airborne Grafix

Some of our poster art gracing the offices of Airborne Grafix, the company that does our airship branding layout and design in Germany.

Odd what you find...

I was using a search engine today to bring up a recent news story about some guys in Australia, including two von Zeppelin relatives, that had founded a new airship company. Among the search results, my eye was drawn to the title "Cocooned away in a Zeppelin of your own". So I clicked, and found that in Australia, you can buy a house that looks like a Zeppelin!

It has a great ocean view and a master bedroom in the nose. With the Australian dollar being about the same as the US dollar, this unusual property in Wye River can be yours for about $650k!

Oh, and the story about the new Zeppelin company is here.

Zeppelin 3K

Coming up on 3000 hours...

Black Zeppelin (Wine)

Stillman is at it again -- this time with "Black Zeppelin", a 2009 Monterey Petite Syrah. Looking forward to giving it a try with some wild game this holiday season.

Available by the case, direct from the vintner, at Red Zeppelin Winery

Ben in Pilot Whites

Zeppelin Pilot-in-Training Ben Travis recently returned from ground school in Germany, and this morning he had his first training flight aboard Eureka here in the US, with Fritz as his instructor.

Go Ben!

Call Center Art

Eureka takes on a storm on the whiteboard in our call center.

Night Time Ops and Hangar Time Lapse

Check out this time-lapse and live footage of Eureka operating out of Moffett Field, CA, Hangar 2, courtesy of Singularity University.

A Loo With A View

Look what just hit my desk -- Luke Barclay's 'Good Loo Hunting,' a little coffee table book of some of the world's "most scenic cisterns and panoramic privies." And what's this featured on page 14? Eureka's private office, of course!

Zeppelin Anime - Detective Conan: The Lost Ship in the Sky

First the Zeppelin NT made a guest audio appearance in the Disney-Pixar movie UP. Now we hear from Hiroyuki Watanabe, our airship friend in Japan, that the NT has an on-screen role in a major Japanese animated feature, "Detective Conan: The Lost Ship in the Sky".

The DVD and Blu-ray versions are slated to be released November 16.

In the meantime, see this clip featuring the airship on YouTube.

Be sure to watch the whole thing, as there is a mix of animation and some live action shots of ship #2 in the closing credits (about 7 minutes into the clip).

Down at the Farm

Yesterday, the Farmers Airship made her debut on FarmVille, a virtual airship, protecting virtual crops.

Learn more at the Farmers facebook page.

Can you hear me now?

Matthew and Jeremy send these pictures of our transponder passing inspection, thanks to a visit from Barry Turner Avionics.

We are required to test it at least once every 2 years, and our last test was done back in 2008 upon arrival to the US in Beaumont, Texas.

Stanford Game

Jeffrey Vaughn sent us these photos he took aboard Eureka on Saturday while covering the Stanford Game.

This was our first football game, and the first football game ever to be covered by a Zeppelin!

Zeppelin Flautist

Mark may or may not have been the first to perform live music aboard Eureka, but he was definitely the first flautist! He peformed in a band in high school and college called, appropriately, the Hugo Eckener Septet.

Mark and his wife Julie flew with us during our visit to Seattle.

1925 Cadillac Phaeton

The first Farmers auto policy was written in 1928 for a 1925 Cadillac Phaeton similar to this example -- a beautiful car wonderfully restored.

Autoboatome

Featured in the new University of Farmers TV spots. I want one.

Farmers Hot Air Balloon

Checking out the Farmers hot air Balloon at an event in Agoura Hills.

Litchfield: Why Has America No Rigid Airships?

"Why Has America No Rigid Airships?"

Why indeed!

A recent find on Amazon, which arrived earlier this week and I found myself devouring upon arrival...

The book was published towards the end of 1945, just after WW2 had ended, and P. W. Litchfield, Chairman of the Board of Goodyear Tire and Rubber felt firmly that rigid airships had a place in postwar passenger and freight transportation.

The book is out of print, but as of this posting, there are a handful each of the hardback and softcover versions available used on Amazon.

AP Video: Tracking Whales from Above

AP has released their video essay by Ted Warren and Manuel Valdez of our whale research mission from earlier this month, which you can watch below.

Thanks again to Farmers for providing the flight time donation which made this all possible, and to the researchers from NOAA, Woods Hole and Center for Whale Research!

Modern Marvels

Adriano, Joe and Rudy of Modern Marvels. Rudy couldn't wait to get Zepp head!

Safely down

Noon and back in the hangar. Welcome home everyone!!

Home

San Quentin Prison

Lake Shasta

Mt. Shasta

It's a UFO!!

The whale researchers at NOAA were able to solve a UFO sighting reported on The Vike Factor, a Canadian UFO blog. It was of course, Eureka, busy with the whales, but I guess from a distance, hovering below a gray and gloomy sky, she exhibited many characteristics of UFO's. For example, she was 'cigar shaped', and 'moving too slowly to be a plane'. The observers decided that it might be about the size of a normal jet (747 I guess) and they would be right. As the airship rotated and hovered then it 'shrunk and vanished and then reappeared again'. The whole post is an interesting read.

This is not the first time Eureka has been tagged as otherworldly. We received a call about a year ago from someone who was investigating a sighting over the Monterey Bay. The airship was traveling back from Monterey at dusk and seen head on, she really did look like an upside down UFO with her fins helping to create the saucer effect and including a cabin with lights shining out of the windows!

Bye Bye Washington State.

Eureka is just passing Portland and will be landing at Salem shortly on the first leg of our return journey. Weather permitting, Eureka will be back at her Moffett Field hangar sometime on Sunday. We'll post a more up to date schedule once we are closer. Everyone at HQ is very much looking forward to seeing the away team again and being all together for the Fall.

The entire team are advocating for us to go to Seattle more often. The scenery, the people and the hospitality were exceptional - the weather, less so. We unfortunately lost a few flights to weather and the locals told us it "usually isn't this bad", but we wondered if they were just telling us that so we'd come back!

Anyway, we will be back. Thanks for all the fun!

Eyeing the Border

On the science mission yesterday, we got pretty close to Canada. We'd love to take Eureka across the border and hope to visit some of the beautiful cities like Vancouver and Toronto at some point in our future!

Maize Maze

Mukilteo Ferry and Boeing Plant

AP Interview

Brad Hanson of NOAA giving an interview for AP.

Friday Harbor

Roche Harbor Airport

Roche Harbor Airport

Erin's House

Passing over the home of one of the researchers.

Oliver and Kate Hold Our Position

Pod of 8 Below