In 1903, Americans Wilbur and Orville Wright completed the world’s first controlled powered flight at Kittyhawk, North Carolina. This British Pathé film clip shows the Wright Brothers flying in 1908.
The development of the Fokker Eindekker and its propeller-synchronised forward-firing machine gun gave the Germans a massive advantage over Allied aircraft from July 1915 until mid-1916, the period known as the ‘Fokker Scourge’.
Perhaps New Zealand's most qualified and experienced First World War pilots, Clive Collett flew a total of about 1200 hours, many of them on experimental work, on at least 46 different types of aircraft.
Euan Dickson was one of the most successful Allied bomber pilots of the First World War, flying 175 raids, and shooting down 14 enemy aircraft with the help of his observer.
