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Ismailia
was sited as the main location for the proposed airship
base for its close connections to the Suez canal, one of
the worldwide main trade and communication arteries. Considering
at the time, the Suez canal was deemed the most important
trade route throught from Europe to the East. The canal
even today is one of the major trade routes of the world.
Ismalia is positioned approximatly half way along the canal
itself, a perfect connection point for the Imperial Airship
Scheme.
The site was located for its suitability for level well
drained ground and an area of some 600 acres. The location
was deemed suitable in 1926 as part of the main Imperial
Communications commission visit, and a mooring mast was
erected along with a hydrogen gas plant for resupplying
the airships.
Like
the other masts, it
was fitted with searchlights that would flash over the desert
throughout the nigth as a navigational aid to the incomming
airships. A new railway was planned to transport disembarked
passengers to Cairo and Port Said. Unlike the other bases
along the Imperial route, there were no plans to errect
an airship shed. There was however a silcol hyrdrogen plant
constructed, which could produce one million cubic feet
of hydrogen per day. The total cost of the site was just
over £93,000 (£5,127,565 today)
The mast itself was copy of the Cardington mast, with no
additional buildings erected around the base as with the
Canadian and Indian masts sites. The base came under the
command of an officer from the Royal Airship Works at Cardington,
along with a number of RAF personnel. The employment of
local Egyptians would have been made to assist in the mooring
operations.
The September 1930 review saw the Egyptian base as the crucial
part of proving the R100 and R101 to be a commercial success.
It was agreed that the ships would operate a regular service
as far as Ismailia to generate profits for a commercial
service, and the Atlantic and Indian "runs" be seen as more
publicity flights but not commercially viable.
The R101 and R100 would operate this route in the winter
months and then run the "publicity flights" to Canada in
the summer when the North Atlantic was more appealing for
airship flights. It was noted that the R102 and R103 would
be the ships which would have the commercial range to service
the further outposts of the airship scheme. The
1930 review also commented that commercial operations to
Egypt would improve with the creation of the Maltese mast
and the current R101 and R100 would be able to carry more
of a commercial load (passengers and freight) if they could
offset the additional weight with less of a fuel range,
and depend on the intermediate Malta stop to refuel.
In the original flight plan, the plan had been for Lord
Thompson to hold a dinner party for the High Commissioner
of Egypt in the evening, whilst the ship was moored to the
mast. Provisions had been taken aboard for this evenings
lavish gala dinner, including two cases of Champagne. Alas
this party never was able to take place.The
Ismailia mast was never used as the R 101 crashed on route
to the Egyptian mast.
The
mast was still standing in 1939 but then dismantled quite
quickly compared to the Indian mast and shed site, with
confirmed sightings of people based in the area that the
mast was not there by the beginning of Word War II later
in 1939/40.
A
series of photographs were disovered and donated to the
Airship Heritage Trust archive and show the full construction
of the Ismalia mast in 1926.
This
fascinating series of pictures depict the layout and construction
of the ground works and foundations, followed by the errection
of the winch shed, and mast itself. The interesting pictures
show the use of the local labour force employed to help
construction, and transportation via camel.
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