Parachutes were in their very early days. Parachutes were used by the observers in observation balloons.

Parachutes

The british never allowed parachutes for pilots their reason being along the lines of might curb their fighting enthusiasm.

Did they have parachutes in ww1. No parachutes were issued to allied heavier than air aircrew. Whilst the various nations involved began to experiment with the military potential of flight the use of parachutes was highly controversial. It was claimed at the time that parachutes were too bulky to be used by pilots of aircraft.

My interest in the war has mainly been focused on the armies etc so i don t know an awful lot about war in the air. Whilst practical parachutes were originally invented in the late 18th century the use of them from airplanes was still in its infancy at the outbreak of war. Hermann goering was saved by a parachute.

Yet they readily allowed them for spies to be dropped into occupied territory. This was a practice of the allied powers. They were far different to parachutes of today.

However they were large and bulky and did not fit neatly into a fighter. In 1918 germany issued its airmen a compact parachute pack designed by unteroffizier otto heinecke a ground crewman in feldluftschiffer abteilung 23. At least some of the german fighter planes did have parachutes.

During the last six weeks of the war german aviators donned them and eddie saw several deploy. Calthrop a retired british engineer had in fact developed the guardian angel a parachute for aircraft pilots before the war. And that the british got their parachutes about 1916.

On the outbreak of the first world war parachutes were issued to crews of airships and balloons. I heard the other day that german ww1 pilots had parachutes and they had them from the beginning of the war whilst the british didn t. The usual story is that it was to encourage the pilot to recover the plane but there seems to be a bit more to it.

Men in observation balloons used them throughout the war to escape when enemy aircraft set their gasbags ablaze. There is evidence that the top brass did not want parachutes. As a result a pilot only had three options to ride his machine into the ground jump from several thousand feet or commit suicide.

Parachutes did exist although rudimentary by today s standards. Germans had parachutes as pretty standard for pilots by the end of the war ie 1918. Similar parachutes were available as early as 1916 but high ranking officers on both sides of the war had debated whether their issuance would undermine aircrews determination to fight or encourage them to abandon planes that could be ridden to the ground.

Did you know that the use of parachutes was highly contentious during the first world war.