Event
- Event ID
- 12
- Quality
- Description
Following the first flight of the Montgolfier brothers, the first severe accident with hydrogen on a Montgolfier-balloon occurred in 1785, when trying to cross the Channel from France to England. Two Frenchman were flying a balloon filled with hydrogen, which was also carrying a small hot-air balloon to control the altitude. This eventually ignited the hydrogen gas demonstrating its flammability. Both pilots were killed in this accident.
- Event Initiating system
- Classification of the physical effects
- Hydrogen Release and Ignition
- Nature of the consequences
- fire
- Macro-region
- Europe
- Country
- United Kingdom
- Date
- Component involved
- balloon
- Failure mode
- fire (generic)
- Initiating cause
- wrong operation
- Root CAUSE analysis
The INITIATING CAUSE was the accidental ignition of the hydrogen used in the balloon.
The ROOT CAUSE was a conceptual design failure, which did not took into account he presence of strong ignition source in the neighbourhood of the hydrogen onboard.
- Root causes
- Date entry in HIAD
- 01/01/2006
Facility
- Application
- Non-road vehicles
- Sub-application
- Montgolfier
- Hydrogen supply chain stage
- All components affected
Montgolfier
- Process temperature range [C]
- ambient temperature (-50°C to +50°C)
- Process pressure range [MPa]
- ambient pressure (around 0.1 MPa)
- Location type
- Open
- Location
- harbour or waterborne
- Operational condition
Emergency & Consequences
- Number of fatalities
- 2
- Number of injured persons
- 0
- Emergency action
none possible
Lesson Learnt
- Lesson Learnt
The first balloons for transport were using hydrogen as buoyancy gas because it was easy to be produced via electro-chemical process. However, the presence of hydrogen and of a flame onboard was definitively not a good idea from safety point of view. Helium has similar buoyancy characteristics, but it was much more difficult and expensive to produce via separation methods. The modern transport by balloon is using helium, because not reactive.
In-depth data
- Release type
- gas
- Involved substances (% vol)
- H2 100%
- Release temperature [°C]
- 25
- Probable IGNITION SOURCE
References
- Sources categories
- Scientific article
- Reference & weblink
Pages 248-248 in Sloop J.L. Liquid Hydrogen as a Propulsion Fuel - 1945-1959. NASA History Office, Report NASA SP-4404, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, Washington D C., USA, 1978
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/api/citations/19790008823/downloads/19790008823.p…
(Retrieved July 2023)
