ROMA BURSTS INTO FLAMES OVER HAMPTON ROADS ARMY BASE
Portsmouth, Virginia (JFK+50) On February 21, 1922, "the giant airship Roma*...exploded over the Hampton Roads Army base" landing in flames. Four men survived the crash but the Associated Press reports that "thirty-five or forty bodies (are) still pinned underneath the wreckage."
The dirigible, the largest semi-rigid airship in the world, was purchased from Italy by the government of the United States and was recently commissioned.
At the time of the mishap, Roma was flying low over the Army supply base warehouses. The airship burst into flames and fell to the ground "like a comet."
Reports indicate that fourteen men leapt from the burning airship...some clinging to parachutes.
This was America's worst aviation disaster at the time**.
*Roma was designed to carry up to 100 passengers in Atlantic crossings. The US Army purchased the airship in 1921 for $184,000, equivalent to $2.7 million today.
**34 were killed & 9 survived the explosion & crash of the Roma, the last hydrogen-inflated airship flown by the US military. Hydrogen was replaced by helium in future American dirigibles.
SOURCES
"Flaming Roma Falls Over Hampton Roads; More Than 51 Aboard," The Evening Star, Washington, D.C., February 21, 1922, Chronicling America, Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/
"Fourteen Men Leap From Airship, A Few of Them in Parachutes," The Evening Star, Washington, D.C., February 21, 1922, Chronicling America, Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/
