Henri Giffard

Career

Giffard was born in Paris in 1825. He invented the injector and the Giffard dirigible, an airship powered with a steam engine and weighing over 180 kg. It was the world's first passenger-carrying airship (then known as a dirigible, from French). Both practical and steerable, the hydrogen-filled airship was equipped with a 3 hp steam engine that drove a propeller. The engine was fitted with a downward-pointing funnel. The exhaust steam was mixed in with the combustion gases and it was hoped by these means to stop sparks rising up to the gas bag; he also installed a vertical rudder.

On 24 September 1852, Giffard made the first powered and controlled flight travelling 27 km from Paris to Élancourt.

Giffard was granted a patent for the injector on 8 May 1858. Unusually, he had thoroughly worked out the theory of this invention before making any experimental instrument, having explained the idea in 1850. Others had worked on using jets, particularly Eugène Bourdon who patented a very similar device in 1857.

In 1863, he was appointed a Chevalier of the Légion d'honneur.

Death and commemoration

In response to his declining eyesight, Giffard killed himself in 1882,

Gallery

File:Captive balloon of Henri Giffard over Paris 1878.jpg|Balloon of Henri Giffard over Paris rooftops, 1878. File:GiffardAirship.JPG|A model of the Giffard Airship at the London Science Museum. File:Ballooning Bronze Medal Paris 1878 Giffard..jpg|Medal of Giffard's balloon over Paris in 1878.

References

Bibliography

• , ...Correspondence, notes, design drawings, broadsides, newspapers, printed illustrations, articles about Giffard, and newspaper clippings relating chiefly to Giffard's exhibition of a large captive balloon in the courtyard of the Tuileries in Paris in 1878. Includes his notes on hydrogen gas and design drawings for balloons...

References

1. (16 June 1882). "Our Paris Letter.". [[The Bunyip]].
2. (May 2009). "Les ballons dirigeables : experiences de m. Henri Giffard en 1852 et en 1855 et de m. Dupuy de Lome en 1872". E. Dentu.
3. (17 February 1883). "Science. Scientific Gossip.". [[The Leader (Melbourne).
4. "Grand ballon captif a vapeur, de M. Henry Giffard [text]". Typographie P. Mouillot.
5. (23 December 1876). "A MONSTER BALLOON.". [[Adelaide Observer]].
6. (1996). "Biographical Dictionary of the History of Technology". Taylor & Francis.
7. "Jules Henri Giffard".
8. Kneass, Strickland L.. (2004). "Practice and Theory of the Injector". Wiley.
9. "Science Museum - Home - The Giffard Airship, 1852.". [[Science Museum (London).