I Survived the Hindenburg Disaster, 1937

by Lauren Tarshis

  He squirmed and rolled and pushed until he freed himself from the heap.

  But he had barely caught his breath when he glanced up toward the ceiling and saw something that made his blood freeze. It was a sight more terrifying than a cobra coiled in his bed or even a Nazi with a pistol.

  It was fire.

  Fire on an airship filled with millions of cubic feet of flammable hydrogen gas.

  And then, with a thundering whoosh, the room exploded into flames.

  The blast of searing heat knocked Hugo back. His head hit the floor with a sickening thud. Oily black smoke rushed up his nose and down his throat.

  Hugo gagged and coughed.

  His mind screamed in panic, Get out! Get out! Get out!

  In just seconds, the Hindenburg would burst into a giant ball of flames.

  Where were Mom and Dad and Gertie?

  People were running out of the lounge, screaming and shouting.

  “Hurry!”

  “We’re crashing!”

  “It’s the end!”

  Hugo felt as if he were caught in a stampede.

  Then someone grabbed Hugo by the back of his jacket and freed him from the crushing crowd. It was Mr. Singer, with Marty right behind him.

  Hugo had lost sight of them, but now Marty clamped hold of his hand as though she’d never let go. Hugo hoped she never would.

  Mr. Singer looked frantically around.

  “This way,” he said, pushing them both back toward the windows.

  “Sir, I have to find my family!” Hugo said.

  “They’ll find a way out, Hugo. And they’d want you to get out, too. There isn’t any time.”

  Mr. Singer grabbed a toppled chair. “Duck!” he called out as he swung the chair up and smashed it against the windows.

  The glass shattered.

  They were close to the ground, Hugo could see, about fifteen feet up. Scraps of burning fabric filled the sky. It looked as if it were raining fire. He could see that some people from the zeppelin had already escaped. Sailors from the crew were braving the flames to help them get away.

  A young sailor stood just below them, looking up with open arms.

  “Jump!” he cried. “Hurry!”

  Mr. Singer helped Marty climb up to the window ledge.

  “Go! We’ll be right behind you!”

  Marty took one last look at Hugo and her father.

  Then she closed her eyes and leaped.

  The sailor caught her and ran away carrying her in his arms.

  “Your turn!” Mr. Singer shouted to Hugo.

  But just then a dark shape appeared from out of the smoke.

  It was Kohl!

  Hugo had been right. Nothing was going to stop Kohl from finding his prey.

  And now he really did look like a vicious predator.

  There was blood dripping from a gash in his cheek. His eyes looked almost bright red — like his fury was boiling inside him.

  Kohl pointed his pistol at Mr. Singer. This time Hugo had no doubt he was going to shoot.

  “I know what you did!” Kohl bellowed, his voice rising up above the crackling fire and the groaning of the airship. “Hand the papers over to me now!”

  Mr. Singer backed up until he was pressed against the wall.

  The zeppelin was shaking now, the flames churning all around them. It was almost impossible to breathe.

  With every second that went by, their chance to escape slipped further away.

  And then Hugo heard a terrifying noise.

  He looked up just in time to see a metal beam crashing through the ceiling — and it was heading right for them!

  The beam came down like a flaming sword.

  Hugo fell back and rolled onto his side, bracing for the deadly crack of metal on his head. But the beam just missed him.

  It had missed Mr. Singer, too.

  But Colonel Kohl wasn’t so lucky. The beam had landed across his neck. He lay there with his eyes open, motionless, his hand still gripping his gun.

  Hugo could see that Colonel Kohl wouldn’t ever be getting up again.

  But there was no time for Hugo to think about this. The airship was falling and breaking apart. His lungs felt as though they would explode. He and Mr. Singer both jumped up. They joined hands and lunged for the windows.

  Mr. Singer heaved Hugo out first.

  The zeppelin was so close to the ground that Hugo barely felt the impact. He landed on his stomach. Seconds later, Mr. Singer landed a few feet away.

  Hugo got up and turned to run.

  But something hit his back — hard.

  And he suddenly realized it was too late.

  Chunks of the flaming Hindenburg were now crashing down around Hugo and Mr. Singer — the white-hot metal beams. The slabs of burning walls.

  Men shouted to them.

  “Hurry! Get up! Get up!”

  There was fire everywhere now — raining from the sky, rising from the ground, burning his clothes, his shoes, his hair.

  Hugo dropped to the ground and curled into a ball.

  There was no hope.

  His body erupted in scorching pain as the fire raked his flesh. And then Hugo couldn’t feel anything. His mind went dark, his breathing stopped.

  But suddenly his brain flickered back to life, and Hugo felt sure that somehow he’d been dropped out of the burning Hindenburg and into the Thika River. Cool water rushed all around him.

  The next thing he knew he was lying on a soft blanket, with bright lights all around. Was he back in Kenya, under the golden sun?

  He heard voices calling for him:

  “Hugo!”

  “Hugo!”

  “Oogo!”

  And the loudest of all, “Garooo, garooo, garooo!”

  Hugo opened his eyes. It was just getting light out, and he listened for the familiar sounds of a Kenyan morning — shrieking monkeys and cawing birds and buzzing insects.

  Instead Hugo heard hushed voices and footsteps.

  No, he realized. He wasn’t in Kenya.

  He was still in the hospital, in New Jersey.

  But finally today, after forty-five days, he was going home.

  The burns on his back were finally healing. The wounds still hurt. And Hugo had a big bald patch on the side of his head. The doctors couldn’t say for sure whether the hair would grow back. But the worst was behind him. That’s what everyone told him.

  But was it really? Hugo wasn’t sure.

  Hugo couldn’t wait to get out of the hospital.

  He missed Gertie — kids weren’t allowed to visit. He missed Panya, too. And of course Marty, who had written to him every day.

  But part of Hugo was afraid to leave here, to be out in the world again.

  He knew that everyone was still talking about the Hindenburg disaster.

  They’d want to talk to him about it, to hear his story, to share their ideas about what had caused the crash. Nobody knew for sure yet. Some said it was a bomb. Others were convinced it was a gas leak ignited by a spark from the lightning-filled sky.

  Hugo didn’t want to think about any of that. He just wanted to forget that he was ever on the Hindenburg.

  He still had nightmares every night, terrible dreams filled with fire and smoke and giant hissing cobras. He’d wake up screaming, until the nurses rushed in with their hushed voices and comforting hands.

  Even during the day, terror would grab hold of him, out of nowhere. He’d catch a whiff of smoke, or take a bite of a warm roll that Mom and Dad brought for him. And his whole body would start to shake.

  He’d think of the thirty-six people who had died in the crash, like Mr. Merrick. He’d think of Mr. Singer, whose burns were even worse than Hugo’s.

  He’d think about how scared Gertie must have been when Mom dropped her out the dining room window into the arms of a man from the crew. He’d picture Mom leaping out with Miss Crowther, and breaking her wrist as she landed.

  And worst of all was thinking about Dad, who had st
ayed behind to search for Hugo. He’d rushed through the burning zeppelin calling Hugo’s name until Mr. Lenz had dragged him away from the flames and pushed him through a burned-out hole in the wall.

  And what had happened to Hugo? How had he and Mr. Singer escaped from the burning field of wreckage?

  It turned out one of the Hindenburg’s huge water tanks had hit the ground and burst open. Thousands of gallons of water had gushed out. The cool waters had washed over Hugo and Mr. Singer, dousing the flames that threatened to kill them both. During the brief moments when the fires died down, two brave men from the ground crew had rushed in and carried them off the airfield.

  Mr. Singer was in bad shape. But he was getting better, too. He was at a different hospital, but Marty gave him reports in the letters she sent. She was staying with her grandparents in Boston until her father was better.

  At least Hugo didn’t have to keep Mr. Singer’s secret, because it wasn’t a secret anymore.

  Dad had showed Hugo a long article in the New York Times about how a heroic man named Peter Singer had smuggled secret Nazi documents onto the Hindenburg. The papers listed the names of twenty dangerous German spies living secretly in the U.S. The spies reported to Colonel Joseph Kohl, who had died on the Hindenburg. By now, all of the spies had been captured.

  Marty said that she and her father had even been invited to meet President Roosevelt.

  * * *

  Later that morning, Mom and Dad came to take Hugo home from the hospital. And there was a surprise for him in the waiting room.

  At first Hugo didn’t recognize the rosy-cheeked little girl who’d come prancing in.

  “Oogo!”

  Gertie ran up and flew into Hugo’s arms.

  Tears sprang into his eyes as Gertie gripped him tight.

  But these were happy tears.

  Mom and Dad had told Hugo that the new malaria medicine had worked, that within a month of taking the first dose, there were no traces of the disease in Gertie’s blood.

  But only now did Hugo truly believe that his sister was well.

  Gertie reached up and gently touched the bald patch on the side of Hugo’s head.

  “Oogo,” she said. “You look like the baboon.”

  “Gertie!” Mom scolded.

  But Hugo laughed, for the first time since the crash.

  “You’re right, Gertie,” he said. He did look a little like his friend the one-eared baboon. Thinking about that made Hugo strangely happy.

  They walked out to the car. They would be heading back to their New York City apartment. They wouldn’t be returning to Kenya; Mom and Dad wouldn’t risk Gertie getting malaria again. So in September, Hugo would be going back to his old school. His pals had sent him letters and cards, and even a new Yankees pennant signed by Lou Gehrig himself.

  Panya was waiting in the car, and he was so excited to see Hugo that he managed to propel his little body out the window and almost knock Hugo off his feet.

  The raggedy little mutt jumped up and down, trying to land a slobbery kiss on Hugo’s face.

  Gertie’s singsong giggle rose up all around them.

  Mom and Dad each took one of Hugo’s hands, and the three of them stood there watching Gertie with amazement.

  Yes, Hugo’s little sister was well. And it hit Hugo that their journey on the Hindenburg had helped save her.

  There really had been some magic on that ship.

  Hugo looked up, and for the first time in weeks the sight of the blue sky didn’t make him feel afraid.

  He remembered the thrill of rising up, up, up.

  He could picture the twinkling lights of the peaceful world below.

  And he understood he could never let himself forget the feeling of soaring through the clouds on the greatest flying machine ever built.

  You’d think that after writing about the fiery Hindenburg disaster, I’d be having nightmares about zeppelins. But instead, I keep thinking about how absolutely wonderful it must have been to soar through the sky on one of those beautiful flying machines.

  I actually knew very little about zeppelins when I started researching this book. I barely even knew the word zeppelin, and I thought that they were the same as blimps (which they are not!).

  I was familiar with the Hindenburg disaster, of course. And I’d seen the Pixar movie Up, with the villain and his dogs cruising around in their zeppelin. (Fun fact: That cartoon zeppelin was modeled after the Hindenburg’s sister ship, the Graf Zeppelin.)

  But I had no idea that in the 1930s, tens of thousands of people flew more than a million miles on zeppelins. They’d speed across Europe or over oceans with glorious views of the world below. Unlike today’s airplanes, which can fly at an altitude of nearly forty thousand feet, zeppelins flew below the clouds, sometimes just a few hundred feet above the ground. Zeppelin passengers really could see whales and dolphins leaping out of the ocean. Many saw icebergs, like the one that sank the Titanic. Flying over cities, they could wave hello to people in skyscrapers.

  And what luxury! The food was delicious. The tiny cabins were famous for their comfort. Some of the world’s richest and most famous people flew on the Graf Zeppelin and the Hindenburg, which were in fact the only two zeppelins that could carry paying travelers (other zeppelins were used for military purposes).

  No wonder people around the world were fascinated by zeppelins. When the Hindenburg made its first flight to America, in 1936, thousands packed the streets of New York City so they could catch a glimpse. American kids played with zeppelin toys. Ladies wore zeppelin pins. You could even send your friend a zeppelin valentine.

  By 1937, many people believed that zeppelins would become as common as trains or ships. It’s important to remember that long-distance travel back then was very different than it is today. There weren’t highways crisscrossing the country. Airplane travel was brand-new, and planes couldn’t yet carry passengers over the oceans (plus they crashed a lot!).

  Most people traveled on trains and ships. A journey across the Atlantic took nearly a week, and many people dreaded the days of seasickness that often came with ship travel.

  Between 1928 and 1937, the Graf Zeppelin and the Hindenburg made more than two thousand journeys. They flew across Europe, to America, and between Germany and South America. These two zeppelins were so successful that several American companies were hoping to build airship fleets of their own.

  But then came the Hindenburg disaster.

  In just thirty-two seconds, the most beautiful and sophisticated airship ever built was destroyed.

  The disaster was captured on film. Within days, millions of people around the world had watched as the Hindenburg’s shimmering silver skin was burned away and the Titanic-size airship crashed into a heap of twisted metal and ash. They saw photographs of survivors who had been horribly burned. People lost confidence in zeppelins.

  The Hindenburg disaster didn’t just destroy a great aircraft. It ended the age of zeppelins — forever. Amazingly, nobody ever flew across the ocean on a zeppelin again.

  And I can’t help feeling sad about that.

  The Hindenburg disaster might still appear in one of my nightmares. But to me, crossing the ocean in a zeppelin (filled with nonflammable helium, please!) would be a dream come true.

  What caused the Hindenburg to explode?

  There are many theories about this. The most sinister is that somebody planted a bomb on the Hindenburg. This theory has been used in many movies and books. I even included a bomb in first drafts of this book. (I couldn’t resist, but in the end that plot point fizzled.)

  There really had been bomb threats sent to the Zeppelin Company in the days before the Hindenburg’s flight. After the disaster, some of the surviving crew members were convinced that it was an explosive that destroyed their zeppelin.

  The problem with this intriguing theory is that it is almost certainly untrue.

  In the weeks following the disaster, investigators from the United States and Germany inspected th
e wreckage. They interviewed surviving passengers and crew. Both teams ruled out a bomb as the cause of the disaster. There have been many studies since, and none have found evidence of a bomb.

  Most likely, the disaster was caused by a small hydrogen gas leak in one of the rear gas cells. And this leaking hydrogen was ignited by a spark.

  But what caused the spark? This still isn’t known for sure. It could have been a loose wire near one of the gas cells. Or, more likely, the thunderstorms left behind static electricity in the air. (You know when you run across a carpet in your socks, and then you touch your brother and he gets a shock? That’s an example of static electricity.)

  The truth is that we might never know for certain what doomed the Hindenburg.

  What is certain is that the dangers of hydrogen gas were well known. The Germans took precautions to prevent disaster. But in the end, there was no way to make flying a hydrogen-filled zeppelin perfectly safe.

  Was the Hindenburg the deadliest zeppelin disaster?

  Ever hear of the Shenandoah? The Dixmude? The Akron? These are the names of airships that exploded or crashed in the years before the Hindenburg. All of those airship disasters were far more deadly than the crash of the Hindenburg.

  Altogether, 36 people were killed in the Hindenburg crash — 13 passengers (out of 36), 22 crew members (out of 61), and a member of the landing crew.

  Given the force of the explosion and crash, many consider it miraculous that so many people survived. The heroic actions of the men on the ground helped. Dozens risked their own lives by rushing to the disaster scene to pull people out of the burning wreckage and to help them to safety.

  The deadliest airship disaster was the Akron, the U.S. Navy airship that got caught in a thunderstorm off the coast of New Jersey in 1933. The violent winds sent the airship crashing. Of the 76 men on board, 73 drowned.

  Is a zeppelin the same as a blimp?

  They look similar, but they are quite different. Blimps are more like balloons in that they do not have rigid metal frames. Because of that, they are far less sturdy than zeppelins and not used for travel. Today, blimps are most commonly used to film sporting events. That’s why you are most likely to see one hovering over a stadium.