Zeppelin L55 - The full story

Here it is, the full story behind my drawing. This is based on a newspaper article from 1937, when the Zeppelin Stone was built. I therefore can‘t guarantee that it happened exactly like this.

L55 was built as LZ101 during summer 1917 and put into service with the german imperial navy on 1st September 1917. On the 19th October, it took off for its second mission, night raid on London along with 10 other Zeppelins. As they approached the city, they were already under AA fire, but at around 5500 metres, this was not much of a problem. Instead, the ships had to face a far worse and more unpredictable enemy: the weather. Three of the airships did not even reach the target and already had to return because of it. After the ships dropped their bombload – around 2 tons each – they ran for home.

Due to the terrible weather, L55 got off course and lost the group. The hull was slightly damaged, and two of the five engines went out of action. More or less disoriented, L55 continued its flight westwards, to escape over the north sea and then back to their base as Ahlhorn, northern Germany. But by now, the ship was in a hopeless fight against the elements, and the crew had no idea about their current location and direction. Captain Flemming was confident that the ship was still on its course, but the other crew members doubted that they were moving at all. And so the hours passed – with the cabin being almost silent. When morning began to break, the sea was visible, but which one?

Suddenly, AA fire. Flemming knew: „Only Dover fires this accurate!“ They drifted southwards, directly towards the front. As the journey continued, it got even worse: L55 got into the so-called „Cow-Wind“, a treacherous stream over the channel, feared among airship crews. The damaged Zeppelin was caught again by the forces of nature. Another engine went out of action, and the ship drifted towards the awaking front, where enemy aircraft were ready to intercept. Since L55 was one of the new V-Class „Height Climbers“, Flemming gave the orders to climb to over 6000 metres to avoid the danger.

But once again, the weather played its part and refused to let go of the ship. L55 continued to fly upwards, and the crew was not able to regain control. The fight against becoming unconscious because of the cold and lack of oxygen made it even more difficult. After a while, the tail of the ship sunk, and L55 was stuck again at 7600 metres. Until today, this is the world altitude record for airships. Every attempt the release the ship was unsuccesful, and desperation rose. The only possible was was to make the ship frontheavy. A crewman climbed into the hull to get the men from the engine gondolas in the back to the commando car in the front. The 200 metres to the front, along a steep angle were incredibly difficult for the almost unconscious men, but after a while they arrived.

L55 finally began to sink again. Only one engine was still running, and the radio connection broken. The ship was disoriented again, but moving and even on course - at least according to Capt. Flemming. By now, he believed to be over Germany again. He gave the order to descent below the clouds, where they were greated by heavy rains. The terrain below them was hilly, now they were sure that this was nowhere near their base. Flemming decided to lower the long-range radio antenna to establish contact to an airfield, but it immediately broke off due to hitting a tree, and almost took the ship with it.

L55 now followed a railway line, and read the sign at the first station that appeared. It read Immelborn. Flemming flicked through the maps, doubting that this place even existed. But there it was! There were in Western Thuringia, in the middle of Germany and had missed their base by around 400 kilometers. Nevertheless, the crew was happy that they reached friendly territory. L55 lost a lot of gas and was running low on fuel, and the Zeppelin airfield in Gotha was too far away. After passing the city of Bad Salzungen and almost hitting the church tower there, Flemming decided to make an emergency landing on the first field the looked suited for it. Originally he planned to fly a „test round“, but the ship decided otherwise and went down immediately. The first men jumped out and tied L55 to a tree, on which the rope remained until it was cut down in the 80s. The tail was still floting, but a few minutes later, at around 18:15, L55s flight came to an end after over 30 hours. The ship came to a rest on field near the village of Tiefenort, where I happen to live today.

After 15 minutes, the first villagers came and brought food and other supplies. Many were surprised that only 20 men crawled out of the gigantic ship. The crew slept in the village, and our fire brigade guarded the ship overnight. For our small village, this was an absolute sensation at this time. Nobody had seen a Zeppelin this before, some didn‘t even knew that something like this existed.

Despite loosing a lot of gas and sufferung hull damages due to AA fire and the crash, L55 was only slightly damaged. Flemming actually believed that he just can take off again the next day and fly home. From the Zeppelin factory in Friedrichshafen, a train with supplies was called to make the ship airworthy again. But the railway was so overloaded with troop transports, that it took four days to arrive. Meanwhile, the ship was damaged beyond repair by a storm in the second night.

L55 had to be dismantled on location. The aluminium of the skeleton was recycled in the war production, the waterproof hull was given to the villagers. For the next months, the whole village was dressed in black, with clothes made from airship hull. I know some people that still have original pieces of the hull at home. The guy that does all the research on L55 and even keeps contact to relatives of the crewmembers also owns a quite large piece of one of the Propellers. It was given to his grandfathers by Capt. Flemming himself, since he slept in their house.

20 Years later, a Zeppelin Stone was built where the ship landed. All former crewmembers were there when it was finished. There‘s also a small info plate with some original photos of the crashed ship and the crewmembers, but I don‘t have (good) photos of those.