"The hydrogen didn't burn up the Hindenburg." Really?

[Cardinal]

@Jay Leno

A lot of people think the Hindenburg caught fire because of the hydrogen. In fact the Hindenburg burnt because of the cellulose paint on the outside. When you see the famous footage of the Hindenburg burning, you see it burning in a perfect outline. If the hydrogen had exploded there would have been a fireball, but it came down with its structure intact.

But the H2 would not have been in the correct stoichiometric ratio with oxygen, so is this proof of anything? Leno doesn’t cite his sources. Have experts decided that it would have burned almost as well if it were filled with He?

[Gorsnak]

The theory that the Hindenburg fire was caused and fed primarily by the powdered aluminum doping compound (which is chemically similar to solid rocket fuel) has been the subject of some documentaries and has become somewhat popularly accepted.

According to this paper (PDF), it is also wrong.

[Sage_Rat]

The Wikipedia has a good section on the debate.

And quasi-scientific, but the Mythbusters tested it to pretty great effect (in miniature) and came to the conclusion that both the helium and the rocket fuel it was painted in were most likely active members in the fire, but minus the helium you didn’t get squat while minus the aluminum dope, you did get a fire, just a slower one. (If my memory is accurate.)

[Rysto]

@Sage Rat

The Wikipedia has a good section on the debate.

And quasi-scientific, but the Mythbusters tested it to pretty great effect (in miniature) and came to the conclusion that both the helium and the rocket fuel it was painted in were most likely active members in the fire, but minus the helium you didn’t get squat while minus the aluminum dope, you did get a fire, just a slower one. (If my memory is accurate.)

I don’t think that your memory is accurate.

Helium?

[Una_Persson]

@Rysto

I don’t think that your memory is accurate.

Helium?

He probably meant radon. It is a killer, after all.

[Sage_Rat]

hydrogen

[Stranger_On_A_Train]

@Una Persson

He probably meant radon. It is a killer, after all.

So is dihydrogen monoxide, and yet you don’t see anybody blaming it for the Hindenberg disaster.

Stranger

[Princhester]

@Stranger On A Train

So is dihydrogen monoxide, and yet you don’t see anybody blaming it for the Hindenberg disaster.

Stranger

On the contrary, it’s only elevated levels of dihydrogen monoxide at surface level in the region between Europe and the US that motivated construction of the Hindenburg in the first place.

[Zabali_Clawbane]

@Sage Rat

And quasi-scientific, but the Mythbusters tested it to pretty great effect (in miniature) and came to the conclusion that both the helium and the rocket fuel it was painted in were most likely active members in the fire, but minus the helium you didn’t get squat while minus the aluminum dope, you did get a fire, just a slower one. (If my memory is accurate.)

Substitute hydrogen for helium and this is what I recall as well.

[Gorsnak]

@Princhester

On the contrary, it’s only elevated levels of dihydrogen monoxide at surface level in the region between Europe and the US that motivated construction of the Hindenburg in the first place.

I don’t know if I’d call those levels elevated, per se…

[Beware_of_Doug]

Yeah, by definition they’re at 0’ above sea level, being that, hey, the sea.

[Princhester]

Meh, you’re just re-writing the rules to win the argument. You’re starting at the *top * of the dihydrogen monoxide and then suggesting it’s not elevated because there isn’t (significant) dihydrogen monoxide above that. Try starting at *ground * level.

And with that I refuse to hijack this thread any further.

[DSYoungEsq]

Notice that part of the problem is that those elevated levels of dihydrogen monoxide are polluted (with salts).

[Really_Not_All_That_Bright]

Erm…

There quite clearly is a fireball, anyway.

[Flander]

The HORROR of zeppelins!!
Ohh! The humanity!!

[Monty]

Didn’t the Mythbusters bust this one?

[UncleRojelio]

@Monty

Didn’t the Mythbusters bust this one?

Once, in 1960.