The Airship:
The Airship Pirafone was a First-Generation Traditional Airship, comprised of two floors: a lower First Floor containing amenities like a salon, ballroom, dining room, and game room, and an upper Second Floor containing small lounges and bedroom suites.
On the evening of 15 December 1251, the Pirafone was under the leadership of Captain William Solomon, assisted by First Officer Kurt Wallings, Ground Communications Officer Sherrod Georges, Air Communications Officer James Tummel, Navigation Officer Mark Kormann, and Mechanics Officer Pheredon Clime.
The Incident:
The Airship Pirafone was originally scheduled to depart the Greater Hasphitat Airfield on 15 December 1251 at 9:00AM, make stopovers in Ligam, Cotts, and Hotay, and then arrive at Linbrae on 18 December.
The departure was nothing out of the ordinary. However, one hour before the Pirafone's scheduled arrival at Ligam, an explosion out of the side of the airship blew off Engine Four, sending it falling to the ground below. The Boiler Room surrounding Engine Four became depressurized, causing the door to the Boiler Room to be jammed shut. Airship hydraulics were partially lost while the most important part of the airship, the lift chamber system, was compromised.
Solomon tried to find a nearby airfield for an emergency landing, but the nearest one was too far away. So he ordered that the undamaged lift chambers be sealed from the damaged one, and cross-fed the chambers so that the airship could remain balanced. The most important thing, however, was that Solomon accepted that the airship would not stay afloat for long, and thus planned for a crash-landing.
Using what many would later consider to be "incredible airmanship," Captain Solomon searched for and spotted the nearest open field deemed large enough for the landing of an airship. The field he spotted was the Galleston Farm located in the town of North Kempton, which was a very small town at the time. The Pirafone gently touched down on this wheat field with a lot of scrapes and bumps. Despite the incident, there were no deaths; and the only injury was a broken wrist sustained by a certain passenger named Cray Fenton, who would later play a significant role in North Kempton in the years to come.
William Solomon's decisions earned him national fame, as the resulting attention led the Galleston family to sell a large portion of their field to be converted into the William Solomon Airfield. This formed the groundwork for the economic boom of North Kempton in the years to come.
Investigation, Resolution:
The National Department of Public Transit conducted an investigation, which revealed that a hot water heater exploding in the Boiler Room was what caused the incident. However, authorities were unable to determine an exact cause for the water heater explosion in the first place. For assistance, they contracted an independent investigator named Daniel Orville Carter to conduct a survey of the crash site in order to rule out evidence of foul play involving darkfire cartels, owing to darkfire cartel violence being an issue at the time.
Carter stated later on that he felt their rationale here may have been a bit foolish. He did, however, find a strange foam-like residue on one of the pipes leading up to the water heater. This led Carter up to the crew kitchen which contained a mechanical dishwasher using a certain detergent known as "Grimeaway." Though this matter was not particularly related to Carter's main expertise, darkfire, Carter was familiar with substances like "Grimeaway," a basic product enhanced by spellfire properties.
This led to another point of confusion, because "Grimeaway" was designed to dissolve in water. However, Carter obtained a copy of the Dining Room Menu of the Pirafone on the evening of 15 December, and found that for every hour, the dining crew had been serving a particular sweet-snack item containing corn syrup, a rare sweetener at the time. Carter mixed this corn syrup with "Grimeaway" and water, and discovered that it did not take large quantities of corn syrup mixed in to cause a gum-like substance to form, stick, and block blocking water pipes.
Carter then studied the plumbing system of the Pirafone and noted its use of the Modern Estrayon System, a complex high-pressure-based plumbing network to help ensure that pipes do not get clogged or backed up. This System, however, as Carter discovered, could not overcome the blockages produced by the "Grimeaway," water, and corn syrup mixture, as he tested in a laboratory in a warehouse in the Basin District. During this test, an exact replica of the Pirafone plumbing system was constructed; and when the test was run, the water heater exploded in very much the same fashion as the one aboard the Pirafone.
In response to this, Retunian Council passed legislation banning Grimeaway on all airships; "Grimeaway" would eventually be recalled altogether. Legislation also mandated that an extra set of automatic release valves be installed on every plumbing system of every airship.