In March 1918 it suffered heavy losses flying ground attack sorties against the German Spring Offensive.It was initially equipped with Hawker Hind biplane light bombers, these being replaced by Fairey Battle monoplanes from November 1937.Although it had no aircrew, it did have 21 Hawker Audaxes on charge, which were occasionally flown by members of other units based at Habbaniya on reconnaissance missions.[7] A major role of the new squadron was flying air mail over the Himalaya Mountains to China, the so-called "Hump route".[5][7] The Squadron received a number of Liberators in December 1944 for Hump operations, with a few Beechcraft Expeditor light transports and de Havilland Tiger Moths modified as air ambulances in 1945.