In 1900, Count Ferdinand von Zeppelin successfully performed the maiden flight of his first airship; further models quickly followed. Prior to the First World War, Germany was a world leader in the field, largely attributable to the work of von Zeppelin and his Luftschiffbau Zeppelin company. During the conflict, rigid airships were tasked with various military duties, which included their participation in Germany's strategic bombing campaign. Numerous rigid airships were produced and employed with relative commercial success between the 1900s and the late 1930s. The heyday of the rigid airship was abruptly ended by the destruction of the "Hindenburg" by fire on 6 May 1937. The disaster not only destroyed the biggest zeppelin in the world but caused considerable reputation damage to rigid airships in general. Amid widespread public safety concerns, several nations opted to permanently ground their existing rigid airships and scrap them in subsequent years.