The Whale in the Sky?
I like people who dream aloud.
French designer Jean-Marie Massaud is one of them. This project is called “Manned cloud”. It’s a whale in the Sky.
His objective : “reconcile our desires and our human responsibility”.
“Manned Cloud” is not only about transportation. It’s a “cruise airship”, an eco- hotel, from which you will contemplate earth without hurting it.
Holy flying whale…
January 7th, 2008 at 2:42 am
Hello,I am Cherry,an editor of Xiao Ge Bai Ni ?China’s science magzine for kids).
Do you have any big images about the “Holy flying whale” that designed by Jean-Marie Massaud? I want to write an article about this.
Best wishes
Cherry
June 11th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
best airship design ever seen… LOL
July 6th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Stunningly beautiful design concept, but the helium envelope will need to be substantially bigger to carry the required payload for a flying hotel.
Both the fins / winglets are adding to the weight. Nevertheless such a design could work if they were to generate extra lift in flight, in which case we’d be talking about a ‘hybrid airship design’. This however implies a requirement for extra propulsion power, which in turn may translate into more noise, a lesser ‘coasting ability’, extra weight reducing the payload and more fuel spent in flight.
A very large helium envelope should however draw huge benefits from having these whale like streamlined features, because of the enormous surface areas. In that respect Jean-Marie Massaud definitely is onto something and that makes this design look more realistic. His 100% totally awesome concept art is showing, more than anything else, that the airship dream is alive and that we just need the inspriration (and very very clever engineers + funding!) to make projects like this take off in the future.
July 8th, 2008 at 3:51 pm
May you be right, Joost !
Thanks for the insight.