Eyes in the sky: balloons and Zeppelins over the front
Anyone floating over Ypres in a balloon today looks at the same landscape that balloons hung over between 1914 and 1918. But with a very different job: they were no pleasure trips, they were the eyes of the artillery. Here is a short look at what we found out, with a few stories you may not know yet.
Eyes in the sky
Around Ypres the Germans held the higher ground and had a view of the British positions for almost four years. To balance this, the Allies used kite balloons: elongated, hydrogen-filled balloons held to the ground by a cable on a winch. British soldiers called them “sausages” or “Ruperts”.
1,000 to 1,500 metres
The balloon hung about 5.5 kilometres behind the front, held by a cable on a winch.
Ten minutes down
At normal speed it took about ten minutes to winch a balloon back to the ground.
A parachute in the basket
Observers were given a parachute from 1915, but it was not always reliable.
The basket usually carried two observers, with telephone, binoculars and a camera. A telephone line ran down alongside the cable. Their main job: watch where their own artillery’s shells landed and report it. Airsickness was a constant plague, since a tethered balloon sways in the wind.
A dangerous job
Hydrogen burns easily. In an active sector a balloon lasted around two weeks on average. By 1918, with more and more attacks by fighter aircraft, that could drop to about half a day.
Just before the Third Battle of Ypres in 1917, six German Albatros fighters of Jasta 4 attacked a group of British kite balloons. Three balloons went up in flames, but all eleven observers jumped from the basket by parachute and survived.
Belgian aviation history also knows a “balloon buster”: Willy Coppens shot down more than thirty enemy balloons in 1918. Sources differ slightly on the exact number.
Around Ypres
The balloon crews around Ypres were not spared either. On 27 and 28 October 1917, Section 39 of the 8th Balloon Company came under German shellfire and two men were killed. On 17 November 1917 a shell hit a slit trench where that section’s ground crew had taken cover: nine men were killed. Eight of them lie buried side by side at New Irish Farm Cemetery, near Ypres. Wondering what such cemeteries look like from the air? Read our story about war cemeteries from a balloon.
And the Zeppelins?
Zeppelins were not used as fixed lookout posts over the Westhoek: that role belonged to kite balloons and aeroplanes. But they did make themselves seen. On the night of 13 April 1915, a German army airship, Zeppelin LZ 35, was on a bombing raid to Poperinge. It was damaged during the attack and made an emergency landing near Aalter. A storm then destroyed it, but all twelve people on board survived.
The same night, a local resident near Dikkebus and Vlamertinge wrote in his diary how a German Zeppelin flew over, how bombs fell and how soldiers fired rifles at the airship.
What you see today
We fly free with the wind, not on a cable, and with a very different aim: enjoying the landscape. But on a clear day you can still see what those observers studied: the town of Ypres, the cemeteries, and in the fields the traces of craters and trenches. You can read more in our pages on battlefield flights over Ypres, trenches, craters and bunkers from the air and on a balloon ride in Ypres.
- Kite balloons hung at about 1,000 to 1,500 metres, some 5.5 kilometres behind the front
- A telephone line ran down alongside the cable
- In an active sector a balloon lasted about two weeks on average
- Zeppelin LZ 35 was on its way to Poperinge on 13 April 1915
- Eight balloon men lie side by side at New Irish Farm Cemetery near Ypres
Sources: Western Front Association: Observation Balloons on the Western Front, Western Front Association: Balloonatics during the First World War, NZHistory: British kite balloon, Aviation Safety Network: Zeppelin LZ 35 and De Kronieken van de Westhoek (in Dutch). Please check the details yourself if you want to use them for research.
