The annual 'Zeppelins are making a comeback' article

An article just like this keeps getting published almost every year. They haven't come back yet. [Link]

As the cost of fuel soars and the pressure mounts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, several schemes for a new generation of airship are being considered by governments and private companies. “It’s a romantic project,” said Mr. Massaud, 45, sitting amid furniture designs in his Paris studio, “but then look at Jules Verne.”

It has been more than 70 years since the giant Hindenburg zeppelin exploded in a spectacular fireball over Lakehurst, N.J., killing 36 crew members and passengers, abruptly ending an earlier age of airships. But because of new materials and sophisticated means of propulsion, a diverse cast of entrepreneurs is taking another look at the behemoths of the air.

Gulf Times Airship seeks Kalahari diamond mines June 2006

USA Today Paris Air Show points to flight paths for aviation's future June 2005

BBC Paris Air Show: Speed and size June 2001

Time More Than Hot Air July 2000

Seattle Times Zeppelins May Make A Comeback With Flights Over The Alps January 1999

Ubiquitous zeppelins has become a shorthand for being in a parallel universe. [Link]

"A startling number of alternative histories wind up strengthening the marginal technology of airships and zeppelins, for example. This is a matter of flavor rather than logic, but this is a game book, after all." - GURPS Infinite Worlds If your characters have entered a parallel universe that's just a few steps removed from our own, the fastest way to establish it is by sticking a whopping great zeppelin in the sky. In our world, of course, zeppelins and other airships decreased rapidly in popularity after the 1930s, partly because of the Hindenburg crash and partly because advances in plane technology left them rather redundant except as decadent novelties. Though they are making a comeback for some applications, particularly logging. So by filling up Earth 2 with bulbous aircraft rather than hovercars or spaceships, you are suggesting a world that is of a similar time period to our own, but just happened to follow a different technological route. It also helps that they have lots of Steam Punk cred and are sufficiently olde-worlde to be used in fantasy stories too. They are also cool. Alternatively, the zeppelins are just there to show the audience that the movie is set in another world, even if nobody from our world crosses over into it.

And I love this bit:

Kenneth Hite noted this trope in his column Suppressed Transmission, and took it to its logical conclusion: our own history was an Alternate Universe in the early 20th century.

• One of Ken's contributions to GURPS Infinite Worlds is a table to randomly generate alternate technologies for one's randomly-generated worldline; it has a note that certain results dictate adding zeppelins regardless of the rest of the universe's tech level. Apparently, alternate history just generates airships.