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Over the course of the war, the role of the military aviator progressed from one of mere observation to a deadly offensive role. Early on, pilots would fly off armed only with pistols (or completely unarmed)—by 1918, fighter planes and massive bombers were in use, armed with multiple machine guns and devastating explosive payloads.

Aerial photography developed into an indispensable tool to guide artillery attacks and assess damage afterward. The pilots of these new aircraft took tremendous risks—vulnerable to enemy fire, at the mercy of the weather, flying new, often experimental aircraft.

A French SPAD S.XVI two-seat biplane reconnaissance aircraft, flying over Compeign Sector, France in 1918. Note the zig-zag patterns of defensive trenches in the fields below.  

German pilot Richard Scholl and his co-pilot Lieutenant Anderer, in flight gear beside their Hannover CL.II biplane in 1918.

British Handley-Page bombers on a mission, over the Western Front.

German soldiers attend to a stack of gas canisters attached to a manifold.

A German Type Ae 800 observation balloon ascending.

A captured German Taube monoplane, on display in the courtyard of Les Invalides in Paris, in 1915. The Taube was a pre-World War I aircraft, only briefly used on the front lines, replaced later by newer designs. 

A soldier poses with a Hythe Mk III Gun Camera during training activities at Ellington Field, Houston, Texas in April of 1918.

Captain Ross-Smith (left) and Observer in front of a Modern Bristol Fighter, 1st Squadron A.F.C. Palestine, February 1918. 

Wreckage of a German Albatross D. III fighter biplane.

Unidentified pilot wearing a type of breathing apparatus.

A Farman airplane with rockets attached to its struts.

A German balloon being shot down.

An aircraft in flames falls from the sky.

A German Pfalz Dr.I single-seat tri-plane fighter aircraft, ca. 1918. 

Observation Balloons near Coblenz, Germany.

Observer in a German balloon gondola shoots off light signals with a pistol.

British reconnaissance plane flying over enemy lines, in France.

German soldiers attend to an upended German aircraft. 

A Sunday morning service in an aerodrome in France. The Chaplain conducting the service from an aeroplane.   

An observer in the tail tip of the English airship R33 on March 6, 1919.

Soldiers carry a set of German airplane wings. 

Two pilots seated in a Farman MF.11 Shorthorn bomber. The plane bears the insignia of the first unit, a Croix de Guerre, ca. 1915. 

French Military Dirigible "Republique". 

A German pilot lies dead in his crashed airplane in France, in 1918. 

A German Pfalz E.I prepares to land, April 1916.

A returning observation balloon. A small army of men, dwarfed by the balloon, are controlling its descent with a multitude of ropes.

A German hydroplane, ca. 1918.

French Cavalry observe an Army airplane fly past. 

Attaching a 100 kg bomb to a German airplane.

An aircraft. crashed and burning in German territory, ca. 1917.

A Sopwith 1 1/2 Strutter biplane aircraft taking off from a platform built on top of HMAS Australia's midships "Q" turret, in 1918. 

An aerial photographer with a Graflex camera, ca. 1917-18.

14th Photo Section, 1st Army, "The Balloonatic Section". 1918. Air Service Photographic Section. 

A British Commander starting off on a raid, flying an Airco DH.2 biplane.

The bombarded barracks at Ypres, viewed from 500 ft.

No. 1 Squadron, a unit of the Australian Flying Corps, in Palestine in 1918.