was not a success, as during the last flight an explosion took
place and both Woelfert and an aeronaut named Knabe, who was
accompanying him, were killed.

In 1906, Major von Parseval experimented, in Berlin, with a
non-rigid type of airship. His first ship had a volume of 65,200
cubic feet, but owing to his system of suspensions, the car hung
27 feet 6 inches below the envelope. A Daimler engine was used,
driving a four-bladed propeller. Owing to the great overall
height of this ship, experiments were made to determine a system
of rigging, enabling the car to be slung closer to the envelope,
and in later types the elliptical rigging girdle was adopted.
His later ships were of large dimensions and proved very
satisfactory. About the same time Major Gross also built
airships for the German aeronautical battalion.

It is, however, the rigid airship that has made Germany famous,
and we must now glance at the evolution of these ships with which
we became so familiar during the war.

The first rigid airship bearing any resemblance to those of the
present day was designed by David Schwartz, and was built in St.
Petersburg in 1893. It was composed of aluminium plates riveted
to an aluminium framework. On inflation, the frame-work
collapsed and the ship was unusable.

In 1895 he designed a second rigid airship, which was built in
Berlin by Messrs. Weisspfennig and Watzesch. The hull framework
was composed of aluminium and was 155 feet long, elliptical in
cross section, giving a volume of 130,500 cubic feet. It was