# Lifting Body Airship Design

How a fast lifting\-body airship stays aloft, with helium lift from its hull, wing lift at speed, and tilting fans for take\-off\.

By Chrome Talon

Topic: Engineering

[Open the interactive Jig](https://ask.jig.com/j/efptSlTej2Sj)

## Transcript

### 1. Lifting Body Airship Design

This fast airship is a design concept\. Its wide, flat hull is shaped like a thick wing, so the whole body helps hold it up\. Drag anywhere to look around it\.

The concept is about 100 metres long, a little longer than a football pitch\.

### 2. Helium does most of the lifting

Under the fabric skin, big bags of helium make the ship almost weightless, like a party balloon\. This lift works even when the ship stands still\. Helium is lighter than air, and it cannot burn\.

Hybrid airships use both helium and wing lift\. On Airlander 10, helium carries about 60 percent of the weight\.

### 3. The body becomes a wing

A lifting body is a craft whose whole body works like a wing\. Tilted slightly nose\-up, the moving hull turns the passing air downward, and the air pushes the hull up\. This wing lift only exists while the ship is moving\.

Real hybrid airships get roughly 20 to 40 percent of their lift this way\.

### 4. Faster means more lift and more drag

Slide the airspeed and watch the arrows\. Wing lift grows quickly with speed, so a fast ship can carry more\. But drag, the air pushing back, grows just as fast\. Double the speed and both become about four times bigger\.

The engine power needed rises even faster: about eight times for double the speed\.

### 5. Shaped for speed

To slip through the air, this design is longer and slimmer than today's hybrids\. Its rounded nose and long tapering tail keep the air flowing smoothly\. A big propeller at the tail pushes from behind, where the air leaving the hull is slow\.

Design goal: about 250 km/h, close to twice the cruise speed of Airlander 10 \(148 km/h\)\. It is a concept, not a tested number\.

### 6. Tilting fans for take\-off

Two ducted fans, propellers inside a ring, can tilt\. Pointed up, they lift the ship off the ground\. Turned forward, they push it along, and the hull's own wing lift takes over\.

It rests on soft air\-cushion pads, so it needs flat ground, not a runway\.

### 7. Between a ship and a plane

Planes are fast but need airports\. Airships are gentle and can land almost anywhere, but they are slow\. A fast lifting\-body airship aims for the middle: heavy loads to faraway places, much faster than a ship at sea\.

Look for the maker's name painted on the hangar\.