# Why not use the jet stream and lighter than air craft for cheap intl transport? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [October 19, 2005, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963 "2005-10-19T19:24:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/41 "2005-10-20T16:21:03Z")
> [@Evil Captor](#): > > To judge by the major airlines’ habit of going belly up with a certain dull regularity, that statement is disputable. Passenger-carrying airlines do seem to be having their share of troubles. The cargo-only carriers like FedEx and UPS seem to be doing rather well. ---
**Author:** ![Rick](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/9f8e36/32.png) [@Rick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rick)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/42 "2005-10-20T16:41:46Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > You know, the husband and I actually looked into this a few years ago (we were considering building our own singe-seat airship for fun and recreation), but darn if I can remember the quoted price. The problem isn’t so much the _expense_ as the _quantity required_. > > Kid’s party balloons are pretty darn light, so you don’t need much helium (which, by the way, is mined/drilled for, not “produced” - it’s mostly a byproduct of natural gas extraction). But a cubic foot (or yard or meter or whatever) of helium only lifts so much. You need a _lot_ of helium to lift even a single person. > > According to the research we did, manned helium balloons, depending on payload, cost $3,000-10,000 a fill. We actually have a gentleman with a two-seat blimp in the area. He says a fill for the gas runs him about $3,000 as well. That’s for, what, a 300-400 lbs payload? That’s $10 to lift one pound (half a kilogram for you metric types). > > And the darned stuff _leaks out_ Helium exists as diatomic molecules that happen to be very small and can sneak through pores/flaws in just about anything. And there’s the volume problem - you’d need helium by the tanker-truck. And there’s the cost to transport the helium, even in a compressed state, from storage depot to your zepp. > > Hydrogen has _twice_ the lifting capacity of helium… but there’s that explosion potential you have to worry about. Why didn’t you do it the way [Lawn Chair Larry](http://www.snopes.com/travel/airline/walters.asp) did? ---
**Author:** ![Xema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/x/9de053/32.png) [@Xema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Xema)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/43 "2005-10-20T16:53:56Z")
> [@Evil Captor](#): > > A zepp large enough to carry cargo might indeed require that $10,000 fill If it costs $3000 to fill a man-carrying helium balloon, the cost to fill an airship capable of carrying even a modest amount of cargo would be quite a bit more than $10K. The essential problem with using lighter-than-air craft for transport is that they must be huge to carry a reasonable payload, and such huge airships would be expensive (both to build and to operate) and fragile. The Hindenberg was 776’ long, had a volume of over 7 million cubic feet, and carried a payload of 112 tons. For a point of comparison, a typical freight train can carry more than 20 times that much, at comparable speeds. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/44 "2005-10-20T17:12:15Z")
I was going to mention the only marginal difference in lifting capacity between hydrogen and helium, but **scr4** beat me to it. I will note, however, that helium is not diatomic molecules, but like all the noble gasses, monatomic (that is, a molecule of helium is a single atom). Hydrogen, however (in common with fluorine, chlorine, nitrogen, and oxygen) is diatomic. And I’ll also note again that hydrogen doesn’t have nearly the explosion hazard that most folks think it does. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2005, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/45 "2005-10-20T20:30:46Z")
> [@Xema](#): > > If it costs $3000 to fill a man-carrying helium balloon, the cost to fill an airship capable of carrying even a modest amount of cargo would be quite a bit more than $10K. > > The essential problem with using lighter-than-air craft for transport is that they must be huge to carry a reasonable payload, and such huge airships would be expensive (both to build and to operate) and fragile. The Hindenberg was 776’ long, had a volume of over 7 million cubic feet, and carried a payload of 112 tons. For a point of comparison, a typical freight train can carry more than 20 times that much, at comparable speeds. Expensive to build, sure, but why expensive to operate if you’re getting almost all your fuel for free from the jet stream? That’s the major premise of the OP, that using the 150 mph jet stream to carry stuff for free would offer tremendous savings, **especially in a world where oil costs are going nowhere but up over the foreseeable future.** Sure, you’d have to use fuel to steer the zepp and to get it up to jet stream height, but a jet has to burn fuel to keep it airborne for EVERY INCH OF ITS JOURNEY. Weather could only be a problem when taking off and docking, because the jet stream, as I understand it, operates above the weather. Over the hurricanes and such. The window for causing problems would be relatively small. If as Chronos says, hydrogen isn’t all that combustible … something I have trouble with … then cheap hydrogen for lift solves the expensive helium problem. But I’ll have to ask Chronos for clarification found several scientific sites that describe hydrogen as “dangerously combustible” such as [this one.](http://www.scienceblog.com/community/older/2001/E/200115599.html) ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 12:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/46 "2005-10-21T00:43:27Z")
> [@Evil Captor](#): > > The stratosphere is 7 miles up, once you get there, your fuel costs shrink to virtually zero (there might be some need for steering power, but so little it might be accomplishable by solar powered motors). The fact it’s 7 miles up IS a problem. Zepps and blimps never operated at high altitudes, and still don’t. You don’t see the Goodyear blimp over Denver very often, do you? There are issues of gas expansion to deal with, and you’ll need pressurization for any human occupants and certain types of cargo and that will add considerable weight and expense. Pressurized jets use the jet engine to collect outside air - what will you use? You’ll need a good heater, too, not having that jet engine to use as a handwarmer. I suppose you could just limit things to robot controls (no humans required) and cargo that can tolerate low temps and pressures. Next problem - the jet stream doesn’t stay put. It shifts around, sometimes quite a distance over a matter of days. This has plagued long-distance ballons throughou the 20th Century. It causes problems for airlines. The jet stream can abandon one path to take up another hundreds of miles away. This makes keeping a regular schedule difficult at best. Finally - how do you intend to get down? You’ve achieved the bouancy to reach the jet stream, that’s great. In order to _get down_ you need to reduce that bouancy either by adding weight (impossible) or reducing lift. How do you reduce lift? By venting your lift gas… you see, you can’t just fill the thing once and forget it, you have to keep topping it off after each trip. _Maybe_ you could somehow collect the gas and compress it into a smaller volume until it then exceeds the density of air… but again, you’re looking at storage tanks, compressors, motors, and plumbing all of which have weight, take up room, reduce profit-generating payload, and some of which needs to be fueled. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/47 "2005-10-21T00:54:03Z")
> [@Rick](#): > > Why didn’t you do it the way [Lawn Chair Larry](http://www.snopes.com/travel/airline/walters.asp) did? That’s now called “cluster ballooning”. Doesn’t matter if the helium is in one big container or a lot of little ones - it’s still going to require a certain amount/density of gas to lift a certain weight, and it’s going to cost money. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/48 "2005-10-21T00:58:01Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > That’s now called “cluster ballooning”. > > Doesn’t matter if the helium is in one big container or a lot of little ones - it’s still going to require a certain amount/density of gas to lift a certain weight, and it’s going to cost money. \*\*Or, use a hollow, rigid sphere of multiphase carbon materials, or nanotube material, & pump all the air out. \*\* Think about it. ---
**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 1:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/49 "2005-10-21T01:28:04Z")
If the jetstream path varied even more than a mile or two (and I’d bet any amount of money that it does), then you’re going to have all sorts of logistical problems that come up. I subscribe heartily to Murphy’s Law. You’ll be forced down occassionaly in some virtually inaccessible place, have unforseen expenses with hiring extra trucks and people to get the cargo from the different spots, unhappy customers whose cargo was delivered after deadlines because you hit bad weather, etc. The combination just from my own ideas is enough to make me try to make money some other way. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 7:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/50 "2005-10-21T07:54:34Z")
> [@Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor](#): > > \*\*Or, use a hollow, rigid sphere of multiphase carbon materials, or nanotube material, & pump all the air out. > \*\* > Think about it. Someone on this board said (arguing very convincingly) that this isn’t possible; that there’s no material strong enough - which makes sense - we’d be talking about making a fully rigid ballon capable of being evacuated, with a total mass of materials less than the equivalent volume (i.e. one balloon-full) of air. ---
**Author:** ![Raguleader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/258eb7/32.png) [@Raguleader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raguleader)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2005, 9:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963/51 "2005-10-21T09:24:26Z")
Wasn’t someone toying with the idea of a heavy-lift airship for moving military equipment overseas? Of course, I think I might have read about it in a Maxim, so I could be wrong. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-not-use-the-jet-stream-and-lighter-than-air-craft-for-cheap-intl-transport/326963.md?page=2)