Goodyear and Fuji Tape Blimps Image size 2834 x 2244 (8x10 aspect ratio) at 2.27 MB, black & white (Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1985)

It's not likely you've ever seen a Goodyear Blimp moored at any airport with a competitor's airship.

According to what I was told on site at the time of this photograph, it's not their policy. They spend a great deal of money to keep this fleet in the air for promotions, and they feel that setting down with other lighter-than-air vessels dilutes that investment.

In this case, however, Airship Industries, which licensed graphics on the blimp in this photograph to Fuji Tape, experienced one or more mechanical problems that necessitated an unscheduled landing here at the Ann Arbor Municipal Airport.

Pre-9/11, residents were freely permitted onto the field with the ground crews, 24/7. So I'd head out there late at night and ask questions among the few people similarly braving the dark in candor. The Airship Industries crew was a bit more vocal than the Goodyear technicians, talking expansively about their superior technology.

Internal engines driving external propellers via drive shafts; that's how they did it. As opposed to the Goodyear use of two completely external drive engines.

So I took that information over to one of the Goodyear crew and challenged him with the superior technology claims. He shrugged his shoulders and responded with only two words.

"We're flying."

Emphasis on the "we." And fly they did. While I can't speak to motives, you'll note from my photograph that the Goodyear Blimp seems to be buzzing the Fuji Tape airship, tauntingly.

On the day I made this image, I was on the field with a Speed Graphic press camera, loaded with 120 Tri-X (black and white) film. My intent was to capture some higher resolution shots of the Goodyear Blimp in flight, at a distance, with good options for making enlargements. I was just setting up when this opportunity came upon me, so to speak.

Yeah, I heard some yelling. But as you can see from the ground crew headed for the mooring lines, there were a lot of folks running around.

So it was a complete surprise when some of Ann Arbor's finest knocked me to the ground — for reasons that still escape me.