Chelsea Handler

Why did it explode?

The investigations that followed were murky.

The U.S.

and Germany both had strong incentives not to take the blame.

Germany pushed sabotage theories, quietly pointing to crew members.

Others floated the idea that Hitler himself might have ordered it as a way to punish Hugo Eckner for being openly anti-Nazi.

Most historians today agree there's no solid evidence for sabotage

No single cause was ever proven beyond doubt.

The leading theory is that a static charge from the storm ignited a hydrogen leak somewhere in the zeppelin itself.

Yeah, because we wouldn't give them any helium.

No, no, no.

They definitely chose to use the hydrogen and they thought they had enough safety protocols in place.

And to their credit, they had a lot of successful transatlantic flights with this thing.

So they just thought they could manage the risk.

And it turns out they couldn't.

If you do some real deep dives on it, there are some really interesting theories on what might have caused the spark.

All it would take is a spark.

The prevailing theory is that it was a static charge from the storm.

So in the 1960s, a former NASA scientist argued that it may not have been the hydrogen at all, but in fact, the flammable outer coating, that idea has some merit, but most scientists are skeptical of that.

However it started, the result was that the Hindenburg permanently killed the dream of airship travel.