[4] In March 1918 the battlecruiser HMS Furious joined the Grand Fleet at Scapa Flow, flying the flag of the Rear Admiral Commanding Aircraft (RAA), Richard Phillimore.

[8] An attack on the bases of the Naval Airship Division of the Imperial German Navy (Kaiserliche Marine) was suggested to Rear Admiral Phillimore by his Royal Air Force staff officer Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Clark-Hall and one of his pilots, Squadron Commander Richard Bell-Davies, VC.

Training consisted of bombing runs on the airfield at Turnhouse, where the outlines of Tondern's three airship sheds were marked.

Rather than cancel the operation, it was decided to delay it twenty-four hours and Furious and her destroyer screen fell back on Force B.

[8] The combined squadron cruised out of sight off the Danish coast until the morning of 19 July and in worsening weather conditions Furious flew off her Camels between 03:13 and 03:21.

Williams, Jackson and Dawson, doubtful that they had sufficient fuel to reach the British squadron offshore, landed in Denmark.

The British squadron waited for the other pilots until the Camels would have run out of fuel and after 7:00 the ships took cruising formation and made for home.

[11] The German Naval Airship Division quickly had Toska repaired but Tondern was abandoned, only to be used as an emergency landing site.

Defences at the other bases were improved and a swathe of the countryside near Nordholz Naval Airbase was burned to prevent it being set alight by bombs.

The concept was revived during the Second World War and in 1940 the Battle of Taranto the battleships of the Italian Regia Marina were attacked, three being sunk at their moorings.