Airships had originally been produced in Germany for civilian transport by Ferdinand Zeppelin, and were named after him. The first Zeppelin bombing raids occurred in January 1915. They were supposed to be directed against military and naval targets, but poor visibility and navigational errors meant that many bombs fell on civilian areas. Zeppelin raids on England brought the war home to civilians. It seemed extraordinary that a woman cleaning her doorstep in Scarborough could be killed by a German bomb. A major raid on London in September 1915 killed 38 people and wounded 124.

In 1916-17, the ‘Super-Zeppelin’, the LZ62, appeared. It had a cruising range of 2300 miles and a speed of 64 mph. It took part in nine raids on Britain and 31 reconnaissance flights over the North Sea before it was withdrawn in 1917, because of lack of fuel. The Germans used bomber aircraft for the rest of the war.

Although the first attacks caused panic, they did not appreciably affect the war effort. British pilots attacked the Zeppelins with incendiary bullets, which set fire to the highly inflammable airships. By 1916, British retaliation was taking an increasing toll of the Zeppelins. In all, 556 people were killed and 1357 injured in Zeppelin raids.