The Hindenburg disaster at Lakehurst, 1937
A reel from the US National Archives strings together the Pathé, Paramount, Universal and Movietone reports on the burning of the airship on 6 May 1937.
On 6 May 1937 four newsreel crews stood close together beside the mooring mast at Lakehurst as the Hindenburg, arriving from Frankfurt, came in to land. At about 7.25 p.m. fire broke out near the tail; within about half a minute the hydrogen had burned and the framework lay on the ground. Thirty-six people lost their lives.
According to the National Archives description, the reel places five newsreel segments one after another. Pathé News shows the airship over New York and Lakehurst, ballast and landing lines being dropped, the explosion and rescuers running to the scene. Paramount News shows the explosion, Universal Newsreel the inspection of the wreck and the injured being put into ambulances. A second Paramount segment repeats the first, and Movietone News closes with the burning ship settling to the ground. Which shot belongs to which newsreel cannot be settled reliably from the pictures.
The newsreel footage of the disaster was added to the US National Film Registry in 1997.
