LZ-126 was first flown on 27 August 1924. After completing flight trials, she began the transatlantic delivery flight to the U.S. on 12 October 1924 under the command of
Hugo Eckener, arriving at the U.S. Naval Air Station at
Lakehurst, New Jersey, after an 81-hour flight of . The airship was commissioned into the
U.S. Navy as USS
Los Angeles on 25 November 1924 at
Naval Support Facility Anacostia at
Washington, D.C. with Lieutenant Commander Maurice R. Pierce in command. She served as an observatory and experimental platform, as well as a training ship for other airships. On 24 January 1925, U.S. Naval Observatory and U.S. Bureau of Standards gathered a group of astronomers to observe a
total solar eclipse from the airship over the New York City, with Captain
Edwin Taylor Pollock as a head of the group. They used "two pairs of telescopic cameras", to capture inner and outer portions of Sun's corona, and a spectrograph. The expedition achieved good publicity, but it was not very successful in its observations - the dirigible was not very stable and the photos were blurred. On 25 August 1927, while
Los Angeles was tethered at the Lakehurst
high mast, a gust of wind caught her tail and lifted it into colder, denser air that was just above the airship. This caused the tail to lift higher. The crew on board tried to compensate by climbing up the
keel toward the rising tail, but could not stop the ship from reaching an angle of 85 degrees, before it descended. The ship suffered only slight damage and was able to fly the next day. In 1929,
Los Angeles was used to test the
trapeze system developed by the U.S. Navy to launch and recover fixed wing aircraft from rigid airships. The tests were a success and the later purpose-built s were fitted with this system. On 31 January 1930,
Los Angeles also tested the launching of a glider over Lakehurst, New Jersey. On 25 May 1932,
Los Angeles participated in a demonstration of
photophone technology. Floating over the
General Electric plant in
Schenectady, New York, the crew of the ship engaged in an on-air conversation with a
WGY radio announcer using a beam of light. As the terms under which the Allies permitted the United States to have
Los Angeles restricted her use to commercial and experimental purposes only, when the U.S. Navy wanted to use the airship in a
fleet problem in 1931 permission had to be obtained from the Allied Control Commission.
Los Angeles took part in Fleet Problems XII (1931) and XIII (1932), although as was the case with all U.S. Navy rigid airships, demonstrated no particular benefit to the fleet.
Los Angeles was decommissioned in 1932 as an economy measure, but was recommissioned after the crash of in April 1933. She flew for a few more years and then retired to her Lakehurst hangar where she remained until 1939, when the airship was struck off the Navy list and was dismantled in her hangar.
Los Angeles was the Navy's longest-serving rigid airship. Unlike ,
R38,
Akron, and , the German-built
Los Angeles was the only Navy rigid airship which did not meet a disastrous end. ==Gallery==