HMA No 25r - British Airship People

HMA 25r

HMA 25r in flight.

Built by Armstrong Whitworth at Barlow HMA 25r was completed in Oct 1917 but was found to be too heavy and modifications had to be made. The ship was accepted by the RNAS a few months later in December and was mostly used for training purposes at Howden and for experimentation tests at Pulham and Cranwell. HMA 25r was deleted in September 1919.

Some of the known HMA 25r crew.

Engineer A F Stupple joined the airship service in 1915 and worked on most types of non-rigids. He went on to serve on ships HMA 25r, R29, R36, and was chargehand engineer on both the R33 and the R100 ships.

Assistant coxswain Thomas Hobbs joined the airship service in March 1915. He had served on P4 (non-rigid) and after HMA No 9 served on airships R31, HMA 23r, 24r, 25r, R36, and R33. He later worked on both the R100 and R101.

H F Luck

Pilot H. F. Luck (shown left) had strong airship credentials having served on non-rigids since 1913. He took an active involvement in the construction of HMA 25r and was part of the successful R34 airship flight across the Atlantic both ways in 1919. He also flew in the R33 and R80. He later became mooring officer at Ismailia, Egypt as part of the ill-fated R101 programme. This experienced officer later returned to Cardington and became the first commander of No 1 Balloon Training Unit when the RAF took over the airship site in 1936.

Rigger Leslie Moncrieff joined the RNAS in August 1915. He served on the R9 and later on rigids HMA 25r, R26, R33, and by 1929 was attached to the R100.