The first passengers sailed the skies in the Airship Paris zeppelin's inaugural commercial flight on Sunday. The craft is about the size of an A380 superjumbo jet, but flies, 900 meters up, at a stately maximum speed of 90 kilometers per hour. Passengers paid at least €200 ($265) for a half-hour flight.
Where's the Eiffel Tower? —
Though not visible here, on a clear day the Eiffel Tower is visible from the airship as it flies over the Vexin region (northwest of Paris), according to Airship Paris.
'Safest way to fly' —
Catherine Board, the zeppelin's half-British, half-Belgian pilot, says an airship is "probably the safest kind of craft to fly."
But where to dock it? —
The airship readies for takeoff. Its sheer size -- 75 meters long and five stories high -- is a barrier to its wide adoption as a commercial craft: the infrastructure for docking, in France at least, is presently limited.
ERIC FEFERBERG/AFP/Getty Images
New shape in the skies —
Commercial airships have been absent in France for three decades.
