LZ 37

LZ 37 was a World War I Zeppelin of the German Kaiserliche Marine, based at Gontrode in Belgium. It was the first Zeppelin to be brought down by an enemy aeroplane, on the night of 6 to 7 June 1915, near Sint-Amandsberg in Belgium. Returning from its first raid on Calais as part of a group with LZ 38 and LZ 39, it was intercepted by Reginald Warneford in a Morane Parasol, who dropped six 20-pound Hales bombs on it. The airship caught fire and crashed into the convent school at Sint-Amandsberg next to Ghent, killing two nuns, its commander Oberleutnant Otto van der Haegen and seven of the crew; one crew member survived when he fell from the forward gondola. It was the first victory of a heavier-than-air aircraft over an airship, and Warneford was awarded the Victoria Cross.