It was a trek across the top of the ridge on the Pennine Way to get to Mill Hill, the site of the first crash, which can clearly be seen from Google Earth. This site is right next to a footpath and is thus popular. It was eerie walking the several kilometres to get to the site in the snow with the mist down, and suddenly looming out of the mist, covered in a sprinkling of snow was the plane.
This is the crash of a Liberator B-24J from 310 Ferring Squadron which crashed on 11.10.44
This site is spread over a small distance with two engines and some fuselage at the impact point and some more fuselage to the South which can be seen from the path.
From here it was a walk up 'Stairway to Heaven' and the top of Kinder Scout. The hill climbs steeply and the mist thickened at the top, which was incredibly spooky once we left the path and wandering to the 600m point through the deep Peat gullies caked in snow.
It was then a quick hunt on the top to find nothing before walking/bum sliding down the steep hillside. In one stream, Marcell's Hawk eyes spotted a large piece of twisted metal. My navigation (minus compass) took us further down onto the flatter moor to find the next main site, which again Marcell spotted making increasing his lead to 4:1. Not a happy Emily!
This is the crash site of two Sabres from 66 Squadron which crashed on 22.07.54
This site was just above the snow line and by the time we got down the hill to it, the mist was clearing and we could see down the valley to Hope Forest and Snake Pass.
The whole walk took us 4 hours, and perhaps we were walking slower because of the snow and mist, but it seemed a long way back to the car!
