Look up in the sky! It’s not a bird, it’s not a plane, it’s a zeppelin! A century has passed since the ambitious plan of a gigantic airship crossing the Atlantic and stopping at the Canary Islands. The project aimed to establish a regular route with two weekly journeys between Seville and Buenos Aires, with a layover in the archipelago. The media buzzed with the grand announcement, but the economic woes of the country and the eruption of the civil war in 1936 thwarted the Spanish initiative. However, this was not the end of the story between the Islands and the zeppelins. Although the stopover proved unfeasible, the strategic location of the Canary Islands along the route between Europe and America made it a mandatory transit point during the 1920s and 1930s, serving as a crucial reference to prevent getting lost. This allowed the islanders to witness the majestic airships gracing the skies of the archipelago on several occasions.
Also, a hundred years ago, in October 1924, the LZ 126 model ventured across the Atlantic from Friedrichshafen (Germany) to New York on a 30-hour odyssey. The airship was handed over to North American authorities, who rechristened it The Angels. The zeppelin made a pass by Tenerife, an event captured in the documentary Im Zeppelin über den Atlantik III. Telil by Neumann Production, thereby showcasing aerial footage of the Canary Islands worldwide.
Although the weekly Seville-Buenos Aires route, with a layover in the Canary Islands, was being planned in the early 1920s, it wasn’t until January 1927 that the company Colón Transaérea Española received authorization. The monarch Alfonso XIII expressed great interest in the initiative, but the crisis of 1929 impeded the acquisition of the necessary investments, and ultimately, the Germans took charge of the route, adapting it to their requirements.
“No Motion Sickness”
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The renowned Graf Zeppelin planned for the Spanish project boasted a volume of 135,000 cubic meters and nine engines, seven for operation and two as backups. It measured 250 meters in length, 22 in diameter, and 30 in height, with the capacity to accommodate approximately 60 passengers who could luxuriate in cabins, bedrooms, lounges, and even a kitchen. “No motion sickness on board these airships, and minimal risk, as the danger of fire was averted by an absolute smoking ban, except in a special lounge, and the arrangement of the balloons shielded them from the impact of an electrical discharge during a storm,” declared advertisements of the era, promising a four-day journey, as opposed to several weeks by sea, to cover the same distance.
The Graf Zeppelin completed its maiden flight in 1928. On May 18, 1930, the General Directorate of Communications ordered that correspondence be parachuted over Santa Cruz de Tenerife, with 92 letters and 131 postcards embarking from Seville bound for the archipelago. However, the airdrop was eventually discouraged due to its scheduled passage over the capital at 4:30 am on May 21.
Records also indicate that on May 30, 1932, the flying vessel passed over Tenerife and Gran Canaria, and the same year, it repeated its visit in August and September. A few years later, in 1935, the zeppelin not only soared over Santa Cruz de Tenerife but also parachuted the correspondence. The newspapers of the time vividly narrated the excitement stirred by the passage of the German airship, especially when it traversed the skies during daylight, allowing for documentation of the occasion. Rooftops and terraces were teeming with inquisitive onlookers, and those wielding binoculars could observe passengers waving handkerchiefs to greet the islanders.
The success of these grand air-crafts was short-lived, extinguished following the tragedy of the LZ-129-Hindenburg on May 6, 1937. The zeppelin caught fire over an airfield near New York City, claiming 36 lives. Subsequently, confidence in the safety of these colossal airships waned. Adolf Hitler was the first to order the cessation of commercial zeppelin operations. The Graf Zeppelin was dismantled, and its sibling, the LZ-130 Graf Zeppelin II, was briefly deployed for military purposes.
