"If I had my time over again"

[pestw]

Im Airship Magazin (Mitgliederzeitschrift der Airship Association http://www.airship-association.org) ist in der aktuellen Ausgabe ein e ausführliche Abhandlung zu der Entstehungsgeschichte und zum Niedergang von CargoLifter-Gründer Dr. Carl von Gablenz erschienen.

Klasse!

Wer des Englischen mächtig ist, kann es sich von hier herunterladen:
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http://www.zukunft-in-brand.de/presse/Airship143_03.gif
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http://www.zukunft-in-brand.de/presse/Airship143_06.gif (nur Fotos)
http://www.zukunft-in-brand.de/presse/Airship143_07.gif

Wenn jemand Lust hat, den Text in gutes Deutsch zu übersetzen, gerne. Bitte vorher ankündigen, sonst wird die Arbeit doppelt gemacht.

[pestw]

Sagt mal - was ist los? Liest das keiner oder kann keiner Englisch oder ist das Herunterladen zu mühsam?

[Beate Kalauch]

Grüß Dich, Wolfgang!

Du wirst es nicht glauben, aber ich hatte noch nicht die Zeit, das auszudrucken, so am PC ist mir das zu mühsam ....aber zwischendurch muß auch ich Geld verdienen....

Schöne Grüße aus HH
Beate

[WorstOnTop]

Hallo Wolfgang

Ich las, blieb aber ein vergesslich Kind
Was war Deine Frage ? Schreib's mir geschwind

Selbst "Geld verdienen" fiel mir heut nicht ein
Drum schrieb ich nur ein klein Gedicht
was konnt substanzloser als beides sein ?
ich übte wieder Wortverzicht

[Beate Kalauch]

Hallo Wolfgang,

wa muß ich ändern, wenn ich den Text vollformatig ausgedruckt haben möchte, mir fehlt immer der rechte Rand, obwohl ich schon sehr "linksbündig" eingestellt habe? Hast Du einen Tipp für mich?

Gruß Beate

[pestw]

Hallo Wolfgang

Ich las, blieb aber ein vergesslich Kind
Was war Deine Frage ? Schreib's mir geschwind

Selbst "Geld verdienen" fiel mir heut nicht ein
Drum schrieb ich nur ein klein Gedicht
was konnt substanzloser als beides sein ?
ich übte wieder Wortverzicht

Ich bin kein Poet
Na ja - es geht
Ich wollte nur fragen
Will keiner was sagen?
Hats keiner gelesen?
Ist umsonst es gewesen,
Zu schreiben die Zeilen,
Zu scannen die Seiten?
Will keiner beizeiten
Beim Lesen verweilen?
Verliert niemand Worte
Anerkennender Sorte?
Nicht mal aus Wismar
Ein einziger Biss gar??

@Beate
Das kommt auf dein Bildverarbeitungsprogramm an. Meines (IrfanView) hat die Option "Best fit to page" und "Original size (from image DPI)". Damit geht's.

[pestw]

Mir wurde gesagt, dass die Seiten schlecht zu lesen sind. Ich habe nochmal neu gescannt und verarbeitet. Jetzt müsste es besser sein, leider bläht das die Dateigröße jedoch enorm auf. Jede Seite hat nun gut 500 KB.

[Beate Kalauch]

Hallo Herr Dichter, Wolfgang!

Gar nicht schlecht, das war doch die richtige Antwort da drauf. Ansonsten werde ich es jetzt mal versuchen, mit dem Herunterladen. Herzlichen Dank für Deine Mühe!

Gruß Beate

[WorstOnTop]

Ich bin kein Poet
Na ja - es geht
Ich wollte nur fragen
Will keiner was sagen?
Hats keiner gelesen?
Ist umsonst es gewesen,
Zu schreiben die Zeilen,
Zu scannen die Seiten?
Will keiner beizeiten
Beim Lesen verweilen?
Verliert niemand Worte
Anerkennender Sorte?
Nicht mal aus Wismar
Ein einziger Biss gar??

Derart zuvor kommend gewesen
wollt ich danach nochmal was lesen ...

[hilgenberg]

Hallo Wolfgang,

ich hatte auch erst am Wochenende Zeit das Ganze zu lesen.
Teilweise ganz schön starker Tobak. Gibt es eigentlich schon Reaktionen? Ich kann mir kaum vorstellen, das sich die gemeinten Personen so unverholen Korruption vorwerfen lassen, ohne zurückzuschlagen.
Ansonsten sehr interessant seine Einschätzungen zum Verhalten der LTA Community zu lesen, ein Aspekt der mir zumindest noch nicht so bekannt war.
Allerdings muß ich zugeben, das ich, obwohl ich durchaus auch ein Fan von dem Mann bin und seine Leistung nicht kleinreden will, ein wenig eine etwas ausführlichere kritische Auseinandersetzung mit den Fehlern im Innenleben der AG vermisse. Es hätte zu einem ausgewogenerem Bild geführt und vor allem den vielen Kritikern gleich einigen Wind aus den Segeln nehmen können.

Ich freue mich auf eine angeregte Diskussion

gruß peter

[pestw]

Gibt es eigentlich schon Reaktionen? Ich kann mir kaum vorstellen, das sich die gemeinten Personen so unverholen Korruption vorwerfen lassen, ohne zurückzuschlagen.

Die werden ganz still sein.
Dass Dr. Fürniß einen Privatkredit aus Dubai über 1 Mio. $ bekommen hat, kann er nicht bestreiten und hat er nicht bestritten. Schließlich ist er deswegen ja als Wirtschaftsminister zurückgetreten. Er bestreitet lediglich - wie sollte es anders sein - dass dies sein Verhalten in puncto Chipfabrik oder CargoLifter in irgend einer Weise beeinflusst habe.

Allerdings muß ich zugeben, das ich, obwohl ich durchaus auch ein Fan von dem Mann bin und seine Leistung nicht kleinreden will, ein wenig eine etwas ausführlichere kritische Auseinandersetzung mit den Fehlern im Innenleben der AG vermisse.

Der Artikel will keine lückenlose Chronik der Ereignisse sein, sondern eine subjektive schlaglichtartige Darstellung. Und einige Gedanken dazu werden ja genannt. "Haben wir zu wenig mit Partnern zusammengearbeitet?" usw.

Ich freue mich auf eine angeregte Diskussion

Kannst ihn ja bald selber fragen...

[rudipap]

Hallo Wolfgang,

wa muß ich ändern, wenn ich den Text vollformatig ausgedruckt haben möchte, mir fehlt immer der rechte Rand, obwohl ich schon sehr "linksbündig" eingestellt habe? Hast Du einen Tipp für mich?

Gruß Beate

Hallo Beate,
ich habe die Seiten einfach in ein Word-Dokument kopiert, dann mit der Maus die Größe angepaßt (40%) Helligkeit etwas runter (40%) und Kontrast etwas rauf (80%).
Dann gings ganz gut.
Werde mich mal an die Übersetzung machen, oder arbeitet da schon jemand dran, dann bitte mitteilen zwecks Arbeitsteilung.
Gruß
Rudi

[k.moestl]

Für alle. die Schwierigkeiten mit den GIF-Dateien haben, ist hier der Bericht noch mal in Textform

Airship March 2004

If I had my time over again...

Dr Carl von Gablenz speaks out - after months of silence the CEO of CargoLifter has delivered this controversial piece for the airship world to digest...

Although I am not a pilot, and after studying law I went on to work in finance and as managing director of a mechanical engineering company, aviation has always been a part of my life. My father was chief pilot of Lufthansa and my grandfather was involved with Lufthansa from the very beginning. In our family the world has been 'global' for the last three generations and I am delighted to say that one of my sons is doing his MBA in aviation.
However, I am not an aviation enthusiast as such. What fascinates me much more than the flying or the technology is what you can do with it -aviation's potential!

This is exactly what motivated me during my time as visiting research professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 1993/4 to look at the questions of improving global logistics much more intensely The economical globalisation and the increasing importance of Asia as an emerging continent paved the way of plans for a 'global transpark', which, as the basis for the infrastructure of the 21st century, was meant to combine cargo streams and to provide a better connection between the east coast of the USA and markets in south east Asia by air.
The concept itself was very interesting indeed, but of course the tendency to concentrate on high speed, including supersonic flights, and the single direction towards Asia via the Pacific were too dominant for me. I am, after all, a European. So I pointed out to all concerned that it is not imperative to fly from North Carolina to Bangkok via the Pacific. Flying via Europe is equally long and has the advantage that instead of an ocean there is another world market, Europe, en-route.
This argument was the basis for my concept of linking several industrial parks around the world using disused military airports - the 'Global TransPark Network', with a hub in Europe centrally located between America's cast coast and South East Asia.

Close the gap

The main part of this logistical concept was also the improvement of the means of transport because, with the exception of the AN 126, the Boeing747 is still the measurement of all things with respect to air cargo. From my point of view the speed was less important, especially for the transport of cargo, but more so the shipping of much higher volumes than in existing aeroplanes. What good is it if freight races through the air at a speed of 960 km/h only for it to arrive at the final destination after several days. 'Just in time' logistics does not necessarily mean supersonic but the arrival of the cargo at the predetermined time. I had a more novel means of aerial transport in mind, one that could close the gap between the slow but extremely cheap cargo ships and the very fast but also very expensive and very limited aeroplanes: An airship less so from a technological point of view but from a market point of view. The first time I mentioned my idea to my colleagues at the Kenan Institute at the University of Carolina their reaction was rather sceptical - or better still 'Carl, forget that'. That won't work!'

Mission impossible

Interestingly though at that time there was information available about plans by a large American aviation and aerospace concern regarding a 'very large aerial vehicle' with several hundred tons of freight capacity, which was based on the principles of airship technology. Furthermore the media carried reports of a flying machine in Russia which looked like a giant discus filled with helium and aided by hot air should be able to lift up to 500 tons - the 'Thermoplane'.

If there already were concrete developments along these lines why give in to the prophesy of impossible ? Through my work as managing director of a mechanical engineering company I still had great contacts to the Verband der Deutschen Maschinen- and Anlagenbauer (VDMA, Institute of German Mechanical and Plant Engineers) and I used those to arrange a meeting with the managers of transport departments of affiliated companies.
During the summer of 1994 we discussed their transport problems very intensely with a unanimous result: everything that does not fit into a standard 40 ft container presents a logistical problem and the bigger and heavier each part is the bigger the problem. Those who have seen the pictures or the film of the transport of a turbine from Mannheim to India will understand the statement of a transport director: "We have reached the edge of possibility. If we don't have a fundamentally new solution within the next few years we will have to close down our production here. Dr von Gablenz, since you are looking at innovation, we need a quantum leap!"

On the 1 September 1994 we got together again, but this time with the head of the association who asked me "If I understand you correctly you would like to pick up the parts at the plant and deliver them directly to the building site by air crane" while demonstrating the principle with a hand gesture that became common place in years to come - up, over and down - to which I replied "That s right. We call it CargoLifter." Effectively that was the birth of CargoLifter. It was clear to me that the niche market for oversized and heavy cargo already existed which, because of the immense problems of transport and the associated costs, opened the opportunity to develop a new flying machine in the civilian sector with the engagement of the industry. If this vehicle could carry big and heavy goods then it could of course also carry smaller cargo but in greater quantities. A few weeks later the 'CargoLifter' was introduced to the working group of directors of transport of companies such as ABB, Siemens ,MAN, Linde, etc. It was agreed to create a new project and I was put in charge of the 'CargoLifter' project.

During this meeting it became clear that the director of transport with Siemens KWU had thought about a big airship as a solution to the problems of heavy cargo for quite some time. This was not surprising since he grew up in Friedrichshafen where he inhaled airship air on a daily basis. Together with his heavy cargo specialist he also attended the LTA Heavy Lift conference in Toulouse where he established numerous contacts in the LTA community.
This was my first exposure to this particular species of mankind and the first time I heard the expression 'we don't have to develop this at all. I have a finished concept! All we have to do is to materialise it!' - an expression which to this day rings in my ears. That turned out to be problematic because everyone maintained this to be true of their concept and didn't hesitate to declare everyone else's concept useless.
At the time I only found this attitude strange, sometimes perhaps amusing. Today I know it as the true cause of root evil. Why do all these experts not only declare their solution as the only one worthy any consideration, but also the only one that meets almost all requirements and the only one almost ready lying in their drawer? Even if this makes some sort of sense why do they have to attack their opponents, who are in reality sitting in the same boat, with the same destination - to finally build a really big airship and to demonstrate what can be done with it!
I decided to withdraw from all this and to go back to where we came from - the demand, the market. What decisions can we make regarding technology if we don't know the exact demands of the potential customers? Which is why we met the directors of transport again to debate further questions: What parts have to be transported today? Weight, length, width, height, how many, from where to where in what time frame and at what cost? What permissions are required and what insurance cover is necessary? What are the products and markets of the future?

The importance of goals

We concentrated on real problems, heavier than 100 tons or longer than 25 m or higher than 5 m. The result was the first real requirements: the average speed to get a unit from A to B was, believe it or not, only 8 km/h and that over a distance of several thousand kilometres. But there were also immense costs involved and sometimes these already incurred prior to transportation to put the necessary infrastructure into place. This showed us that we were on the right path but it also presented us with another challenge - the market requires a 100% solution and the demands of the directors of transport are almost infinite. That's when we discovered the importance of setting boundaries for the project.

The market research results revealed that if we could find a way of transporting goods up to 160 tons, measuring 50 m in length, 8 m in width and 8 m in height, we could satisfy a considerable section of the heavy cargo market and almost all demands for excessive volume goods. This defined the CL160 as the project goal.

When the constant discussion amongst invited LTA experts regarding questions such as rigid or semi rigid, sphere or whale airship did not produce the desired results, we put together a dedicated team, headed by a young man from Stuttgart, and worked through the whole subject by clearly defined criteria which is when we encountered another common problem: The industry representatives were very enthusiastic about the project itself but supporting it financially raised internal control issues.
It took us three months to get the approval of DM 5,000 from each company. That however enabled us to finance the research and would allow us to introduce the project 'CargoLifter' to the international expert audience at the International Lighter-Than-Air Conference in Friedrichshafen in 1996, in English of course and in a professional manner - it immediately sparked the integration of the international lighter-than-air community.
On the same day I was persuaded to fly to Cardington to present 'CargoLifter' to the Airship Association conference and during the same night we had our first telephone conversation with the Americans.
Their first question: "Why do you want to build such a small one?"...

Floating

Cardington was impressive. For the first time I was in one of the old airship hangars and I got a feel for the dimension. My word, what have they created then! And I got a feel for the 'scene'. When I arrived someone presented his 'revolutionary airship collection device', the Russian contingency didn't participate after all, so it was my turn after the introduction of the new Zeppelin NT, Roger Munk's AT04 and Ian Alexander's announcement that he wants to build the old Zeppelins again. The response was mixed – Airship carried just one sentence "Dr. Carl von Gablenz is convinced that an airship can be used to transport heavy cargo.", in other words nobody really believed it. However Roger Munk showed us the first parts of the AT04 the very next day indicating it would be built soon.
And then I met Edwin Mowforth, who gave me his book, which I devoured overnight. He had also researched heavy cargo airships intensively and found a solution that came very close to our own. I paid for him and Lelia to come to Wiesbaden and together with a team of German and American engineers and business experts we prepared for the flotation of CargoLifter AG. Much to Edwin's' dismay we spent two hours on the logo design - the only thing that has not changed to this day! On the 1 September 1996, the second anniversary of the CargoLifter concept, 93 shareholders, amongst them companies such as ABB, Air Foyle, Schenker, Fagioli and other engineers, set up CargoLifter - the company.

I am going to make a big jump here since all of the following events are documented in previous issues of Airship.
Money raised from the founding of the company enabled us to intensify the preparations and we then used those results to convince the shareholders to raise the capital. From 1996 to 2000 the number of shareholders increased from 93 to 70,000 who invested around Euro300million. The first employee started on the 1 September 1997, by 2002 we were nearly a team of 500.

We built Joey and earned our recognition as development company from the LBA (Luftfahrtbundesamt, German CAA). We undertook test flights with Joey from 1999 to 2002 to validate our software for flight characteristics. We developed, with the LBA, the first internationally recognised large airship airworthiness requirement. We built a huge hangar, managed an airship, went through all the certification procedures and permit reports as far as maintenance, got the go ahead for an airport and built a cargo balloon with a 61 in diameter, filled it with over 100,000 cu m helium and heavy cargo and demonstrated the constantly doubted cargo exchange mechanism with a piece of mine clearing equipment weighing 55 tons and we signed a Letter Of Intent with Boeing - and still, we had to file for insolvency!

Why?

Of course mismanagement is always the first and the easiest answer. Everyone else knew it better all along, everyone just needed a free reign - "Carl, you should have given me the authority!". That s all!
And of course we could have done a lot of things better, but those walking paths where no one had walked before, don't always find the right path the first time around.
It was said that we should have engaged with the big companies better. But didn't Airbus indicate at a press conference in 2000, regarding the building of the A380, that the carriage of the huge parts to Toulouse by CargoLifter would be an option. And what good is a Letter Of Intent with Boeing, the largest aerospace company in the world, if your own government officially says it still doubts the 'technical viability' and therefore refuses the financial support Airbus got in the beginning but internally reasons that supporting the LTA technology would empty the trough of Others.

State of emergency

What is one to do with a department for economic affairs which puts all its resources into a publicly supported computer chip factory and leaves nothing at all for CargoLifter?
Interestingly though the minister responsible had to leave in November 2002 after questions of financial impropriety in the region of US$ 1,000,000 were raised that originated from his business partners in the Middle East and had occurred in Spring 2002 and which he did not deny. This way the department had plenty of time to demand the resignation of the managing directors of CargoLifter in June 2002 and through the insolvency to retain its say in the location very elegantly. A remarkable example of governmental appropriation through insolvency - doing nothing did the job of taking CargoLifter out of the equation - we were forced to bleed to death. Maybe I should have maintained 'better relations' with the government minister in order to avoid disgrace on this high level, but at least I still enjoy being a respectable human being and certainly take pride in not having joined the world of corruption for personal gain.
In addition no one mentions that just after flotation in May 2000 the whole economical background changed and companies such as Fairchild Dornier with an alliance of shareholders, numerous orders from Lufthansa and a brand new, ready-to-fly aeroplane had to file for insolvency, nor is it mentioned that the whole world, in particular America but also Britain, is in a kind of state of emergency since 11 September 2001, thinking almost exclusively about homeland defence and military applications rather than considering a civil airship. CargoLifter started in an environment that welcomed innovation, in which we made great progress. However it was a small window and we didn’t advance fast enough to survive the coming times of crisis. We would have had to be much faster to get through thus window before it closed but by then we had exceeded our time limits and budgets too much.

Who would have imagined?

So why weren't we any better? Didn't we have almost all the experts on board or at least at times co-operated with nearly all the players? Couldn't we have worked better with other LTA companies? Well, we did so very successfully with T-Com. Our relationship with Zeppelin was one with plenty of ups and downs and with ATG we had a Memorandum Of Understanding once. But for some co-operation obviously means you can do whatever you want without any consideration for your partners.

So, doesn't the whole industry face a medium sized disaster? I deliberately started my account with an in-depth report about the early beginnings of CargoLifter and ended it with the conference in Bedford in June 1996. Just imagine what this conference would look like today. The gentleman who introduced his airship mooring device was not very successful with his undertaking. However, he joined CargoLifter as an expert and earned a substantial income over the years as well as having had sufficient time for his own projects. And then he felt compelled to go publicly on record in a German television production saying that CargoLifter was nothing else but a kindergarten of engineers and no one has ever had any plans to build the airship. Regardless whether he meant to say it like that or not, the result was catastrophic, except for the media because they are fully capable of playing one expert against another.
Then Zeppelin introduced their NT, today there are three airships, the type certification is in place and they are in business. Unfortunately the operation costs exceed the revenue of 12 passengers and therefore the NT07 is not profitable. Originally the NT07 was supposed to be only a prototype for the NT30, but that was never built.
Ian Alexander's rigid airship design is as much history as CargoLifter, except there's no hangar. The Americans ceased their plans for a cargo airship long ago and threw themselves on to high altitude platforms and airship experts worldwide are following the potential income stream.
ATG? No comment. Just remember that in June 1996 the first parts of the AT04 were put on show already which then were converted to Skycat20 – at home permanently 'successful' they now want to turn their back on England and go to Germany, where supposedly the grants for airships are in abundance...?

I am still surprised by how many of the delegates in Bedford in 1996 later received money from CargoLifter, be it as employees, managers, freelancers, consultants or independent companies. But we all spent far too much time trying to enforce our own opinions in discussions rather than trying to find a consensus. We went through the times of the 'young students from Stuttgart', the 'experts from England', the 'pragmatic Americans' and the experienced engineers from the true German aviation (and from the East as well as the West at that). But with all this enthusiasm, and in the end the same goal we blew it.
We're back to square one, just where we were in Bedford in 1996 only older but no wiser. Instead of using an opportunity available to all of building common ground on the ruins of CargoLifter a lot tried to get a bargain. But even here they failed, in the end no one got it. Now it's going to be a tropical island with palm trees reaching for the sky instead of airships while the caravan moves on to the next oasis - the aerial platform, because there is US$40 million to be had. And whilst some peer towards America the others discuss the concepts of rigid and semi-rigid again, but in any case, true to the fashionable trend, towards a hybrid with remarkable dynamic liftlet's hope they get off the ground!

And after all that I still like these people, because they are inspired by a technology that has an overwhelming fascination - floating through the air! Never before has a technology had the potential of LTA technology, especially now, at a time when finally everyone has come to realise that we have to take better care of our environment. LTA is a gentle technology that can benefit a lot of people globally, because it can float down from above.
It is a pity we didn't build it, but we proved what can be done. We eradicated the global 'Hindenburg Syndrome' - instead we've got the 'CargoLifter Syndrome'! But be not mistaken - the helium virus is still active and after almost two years of insolvency there is a growing feeling backstage 'Shame, it was great after all, we learnt a lot and accumulated a lot of experiences', and can learn from mistakes.

But please not again everyone against everyone and not in public. And please consider it from a demand point of view. I am still as passionate as ever. I am still fighting for the rights of the shareholders in my role as a board director and in conjunction with the 'Initiative Zukunft-in-Brand'. But I am also a founding shareholder of LTA Technologie AG, which was set up in September 2003 in Wiesbaden, headed by the well known Dr. Ingolf Schäfer.

And people in the industry are still getting in touch with me and I still have a close relationship with my companions. And I still study and research the market, and whoever has read the beginning of this article carefully, can imagine, where this market is. But with all the love in the world - one thing I will not subject myself to again - to lead a team of experts from the LTA fraternity. Maybe we should all inhale a little Iess helium? How about a sniff of hydrogen?

Just as I am writing this, a German television station is showing a report about the solution of heavy cargo transport and much to my surprise there are the old animations of CargoLifter and my interview from 1998. Not a mention of insolvency. Instead the programme closes with a statement by a professor front America, 'everything about airships has been painstakingly researched with the conclusion that one has to explore a completely different size category ...

[AndyWe]

Werde mich mal an die Übersetzung machen, oder arbeitet da schon jemand dran, dann bitte mitteilen zwecks Arbeitsteilung.
Gruß
Rudi

Hallo,
Übersetzung ist schon erfolgt - wird nur noch mal Korrektur gelesen. Liegt morgen hier.

Grüße
AndyWe

[Beate Kalauch]

Hallo,

das ist aber nett von Euch, erst einmal Dir danke fürs Reinstellen in lesbarer Form, Klaus - und Dir AndyWe fürs Übersetzen!

Das erleichtert doch Vieles. Und ebenfalls Danke für die Tipps, das herunterzuladen, da hab ich wieder was gelernt!

Gruß aus HH
Beate