Click the Photos for a bigger image
The aircraft (Airspeed Consul TF-RPM) was on a delivery
flight from Croydon to Iceland when it crashed into the hill on the morning
of 12th April 1951 killing the three man crew on board at the time. The
pilot was Pall Magnusson aged 26 from Sentiarnarnesi, Iceland and he was
accompanied On this fateful flight by a wireless operator, Alexander Watson
aged 42, an Englishman from Leytonstone, London, and a passenger Johann
Rist aged 35 another Icelander. According to Ron Collier, the pilot had
apparently opted to fly the aircraft using only visual means instead of
using instruments, as he approached the Pennines in bad visibility he
lost sight of the ground and ran into the hill under full power. As can
be seen from the photos quite a lot of the debris is still on the ground
including
one of the Cheetah engines which has been stripped almost bare of it's
cylinders. There is an area with a number of wooden crosses stuck into
the ground and a small glass jar, which used to contain a poem. If you
are like me, you will probably be leaving the site in a pensive mood,
and you need to continue along the same path in the direction of Crow
Stones Edge, which is reached in about ten minutes walk from the site.
The route that you take from here back to the turning circle will depend
on your ability to navigate on open moorland, if you feel confident to
find your way without the benefit of a path, stay with me, otherwise return
to the lake the way you came. The rocks of Crow Stones edge mark the southern
end of a gritstone outcrop with the weirdly shaped rocks of Crow Stones
poised on its northern edge, and the tors of RockingStones
situated below them.From the tors find
a faint path heading north in the direction of Stainery Clough Head and
follow this until you have passed the rocky ground on your left, and can
easily turn onto a south westerly direction on pathless terrain. Keep
on the level ground above, and parallel to the Clough, and you will come,
with out any difficulty to a narrow path leading steeply down to the confluence
of the river Derwent and Stainery Clough, from here you take the wide,
easy riverside path southwards back to the turning circle and the end
of the walk.
Mick Melvin
Part One