10 airmen killed as Shackleton hits hill

The early warning aircraft, on a maritime exercise, ploughed into the

800ft high mist-shrouded Maodal, in South Harris just before noon.

Last night the names of victims were being withheld until next of kin

had been informed.

The Shackleton, of 8 Squadron, based at Lossiemouth, crashed into the

hill near the top and bounced over it to slide down the other side. One

witness believed if it had been two feet higher it would have been safe.

The noise of the aircraft exploding alerted crofters to the crash.

Early indications were that the aircraft had exploded when it failed

to clear the summit, hidden by low cloud and fog. An RAF officer

reportedly said the aircraft was carrying a large cargo of

''pyrotechnics''.

Firemen, police, and the RAF mountain rescue team from Kinloss were

alerted to go to the scene.

Shortly after the crash, the local doctor and an ambulanceman and

fireman battled up the steep hill but there was nothing they could do to

save the 10 men who had been on board.

One of the first to get to the wreckage was crofter Mr Malcolm

Mackinnon, 65, who was in the travelling grocer's van when he heard a

plane very low and 30 seconds later an explosion.

''After the explosion I heard rumbling and I knew it was a crash and

the rumblings were those of wreckage tumbling down the hill,'' he said.

He said the hill was blanketed with fog at the time. ''I climbed up

and saw red in the heather. I thought at first it was heather on fire

but it turned out to be a body in a red survival suit.

''I saw three bodies at first. You could see it was a four-engined

plane and there was wreckage everywhere on the hillside.''

Mr Mackinnon added: ''It must have happened all of a sudden. There

were some sandwiches lying around, one with a bite taken out of it, and

biscuits.''

He could see that there was no hope for any of the crew and found two

bodies strapped in the cockpit section which was relatively

identifiable.

Stornoway fire officer Mr John Norman Macdonald said: ''There was

nothing we could do when we arrived. It was all over before anyone could

get to the scene.''

School bus driver Mr Angus John MacVicar, who was also soon on the

scene, said: ''The hill was covered with a lot of low cloud when we got

there. We could not see any wreckage until we got further up and the

cloud then began to clear. You could smell the burning fuel.''

Mr MacVicar, 37, who is a special constable, told of bodies scattered

around a radius of 100 yards.

The biggest bit of wreckage was 10 feet of fuselage. He could see a

body was trapped in it and another lay alongside it and the rest were

scattered about.

Mr MacVicar said if the Shackleton had been two feet higher it would

have cleared the hill.

Mrs Kate Hutton, 32, working as a canteen relief in the school at

Leverburgh, three miles away, was told a plane had crashed. ''Then we

heard it had come down at Northton. We thought it was another Lockerbie

disaster.''

Aircraft ''Gambia Zero Eight'' took off at 8.01 yesterday morning on a

routine training mission codenamed Operation Brushfire. The first RAF

Lossiemouth knew of the hilltop crash was at midday when they were

alerted by the rescue services.

Station Commander Group Captain Brian Pagnall said that immediately

they were alerted they scrambed heliopters, a Hercules aircraft,

mountain rescue teams, and every other rescue facility they had

available.

He said that the investigation would look at every possible facet,

''technical, operational, and administrational.''

He said the wreckage would eventually be taken to the Accident

Investigation Bureau at RAF Farnborough where they would try to piece it

together in an attempt to identify whether there was a technical fault.

The aircraft carried no black box-type recorder.

Group Captain Pagnall spent last night visiting the wives and families

of the lost crew.

He said: ''It is a very tragic day for RAF Lossiemouth and my thoughts

are obviously with the families of those killed in this terrible

accident.

''We have many old aeroplanes in the Royal Air Force, all serviced to

a very high standard in which I and the rest of my team have great

confidence. You should not judge an aircraft by its age. We still fly

Spitfires quite safely.''

He said that no special safety measures were taken with the Shackleton

because of its age. It undertook nothing over and above its normal

thorough and comprehensive maintenance programme.

A spokesman at the Shackleton's home base said: ''The board will be

visiting the scene at the earliest opportunity to sift through the

wreckage. Hopefully that will provide clues to the accident.''

The aircraft had been taking part in the routine exercise along with a

Nimrod from RAF Kinloss.

The spokesman confirmed that no calls were received from the

Shackleton before it hit the ground and disintegrated which indicates

that the crew had not seen the land.

The aircraft, which normally flies Britain's airborne early warning

system and operates under normal circumstances far out over the sea, was

not operating in its normal AEW role when the accident occurred.

Some time after contact was lost with the machine, the 120 Squadron

Nimrod with which it had been operating located burning wreckage on the

ground.

Villagers in Northton, nearly two miles from the scene, felt the

impact of the crash. Mr Bill Lawson said: ''You can see where it hit the

hill -- there is a large burnt patch in the hillside.''

Builder Mr Kenny MacKay said: ''I heard the plane going over the

village very low and then there was a thundery noise. You could feel a

tremor shaking your feet but we couldn't see anything because the hill

was covered in thick fog.''

Throughout the day RAF helicopters and Nimrods directed operations on

the hill and for the most part in bright sunshine.

Police and coastguards set up an operations base along with the guards

posted round the wreckage. All the bodies were recovered by 2pm.

Last night a lone yellow Sea King helicopter began the grim task of

winching aboard the bodies to fly them to Stornoway.

The names of the dead will not be released until the initial fatal

accident inquiry into the tragedy takes place in Stornoway today, the

RAF said.

The Labour MP for the Western Isles, Mr Calum Macdonald, expressed his

concern and sympathy for the relatives of those killed.

He said that he would be tabling parliamentary questions asking when

the Ministry of Defence last reviewed the age and airworthiness of the

RAF Shackleton fleet.

The involvement of Shackleton aircraft in an exercise in the area,

aimed at assessing the UK's ability to detect incoming cruise missiles,

was disclosed by the Government in a Commons written reply last night.

However, a Ministry of Defence spokesman denied that the Shackleton

which crashed was involved in the exercise, stating it had been on a

routine flight.

Mr MacDonald had asked what was the purpose of the RAF trials.

Defence Minister Mr Archie Hamilton told him: ''The purpose of this

trial is to assess the capability of UK air defence assets in the

detection of incoming cruise missiles, which will be simulated by

television-guided Martel missiles.

''Buccaneer, Tornado F3, Nimrod, Nato E3A, and Shackleton aircraft

will take part in the trial, operating from RAF Lossiemouth, Coningsby,

Leeming and Kinloss, and from the German Air Force base at

Geilenkirchen.''