Empire of the Clouds story of the R101 airship, which crashed on its maiden voyage in northern France on 5 October 1930. The song was written entirely by the band's lead vocalist, Bruce Dickinson, who initially intended it to be about "World War I fighter airplanes;" Dickinson abandoned the idea after using the same theme for the song "Death or Glory," also from "The Book of Souls". At the time of recording, Dickinson was reading "a big, sort of encyclopedic crash report" of the R101, entitled "To Ride the Storm", which gave him the idea for the song's eventual subject. Dickinson describes it as
R101 new course was set to bring R101 over Orly, based on an estimated wind direction of 245 degrees and speed of . The intended course would have taken R101 four miles west of Beauvais, but the estimated wind speed and direction were inaccurate, as a result of which the 101's track was to the east of its intended course. This error would have become apparent when, at about 01:00, R101 passed over Poix-de-Picardie, a distinctive hilltop town that would have been readily recognisable to the navigation officer, Squadron Leader E.L. Johnston. Accordingly, R101 changed course: the new course would take