Date:	Tuesday 22 July 1952
Time:	afternoon
Type:	Miles M.14A Hawk Trainer III
Owner/operator:	Wilfred Lawrence Foster
Registration:	G-ALGJ
MSN:	2106
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 1
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	Lank Rigg, South of Ennerdale, Cumberland -   United Kingdom
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Private
Departure airport:	Blackpool Airport, Lancashire (BLK/EGNH)
Destination airport:	Kingstown Airfield, Carlisle, Cumberland
Confidence Rating:	Information is only available from news, social media or unofficial sources

Narrative:
This Miles M14A Hawk Trainer was built by Phillips & Powis Ltd. at Woodley, Berkshire to contract 778435/38 and was delivered to the RAF as T9889 in September 1940. It entered service with 15 EFTS at Carlisle before moving to 21 EFTS at Booker, 7 FTS (7SFTS) at Peterborough, 10 OAFU at Dumfries and finally 10 ANS also at Dumfries in 1945 before being put in storage. The RAF sold the aircraft after the War (struck off charge in 1948) and it was first registered on the UK civilian register as G-ALGJ on 15th January 1949 to Wilfred Lawrence Foster. The aircraft registration document uses the former RAF serial T9889 on it as the c/no. instead of the official Miles c/no. 2106.

On Tuesday 22nd July 1952 this aircraft flew from London to Squire's Gate near Blackpool with a female passenger and had landed briefly at Wolverhampton en-route. Having dropped off his passenger at Blackpool the pilot was intending on continuing to fly to Kingstown airfield near Carlisle on a business trip. The further north the aircraft flew up the West Cumbrian coastline the poorer the visibility became and when he arrived over the Seascale area he decided it was safer to turn around and return to Blackpool, he turned the aircraft around but flew inland during this turn and became lost.

With visibility reduced and realising the aircraft was about to fly into rising ground the pilot put the aircraft into a steep climb to avoid a head-on crash with the hillside, the aircraft struck the side of Lank Rigg, south of Ennerdale (at approximate co-ordinates 54°29′38″N 3°24′11″W) with it's fixed undercarriage. The aircraft came to rest badly damaged having lost its wings, tail and undercarriage but the pilot escaped with only slight bruising, he was able to free himself from the overturned cockpit and walked down to Side Farm where he was given assistance before continuing on to the Abbots Court Hotel in St.Bees where he stayed the night.

Following the crash on Lank Rigg the aircraft was written off as "destroyed" on 28th July 1952 when he submitted the paperwork six days after the crash and the registration was cancelled.

Pieces of the wreckage were still present at the crash site in 2010, but these had been removed by March 2014

1. Aircraft Wrecks:The Walker s Guide: Historic Crash sites on the Moors and Mountains of the British Isles p.192 By Alan Clark, Mark Sheldon, Nick Wotherspoon
2. http://www.yorkshire-aircraft.co.uk/aircraft/lakes/algj.html
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lank_Rigg
4. http://www.peakdistrictaircrashes.co.uk/crash_sites/lake-district/miles-hawk-trainer-g-algj-lank-rigg/
5. https://cwsprduksumbraco.blob.core.windows.net/g-info/HistoricalLedger/G-ALGJ.pdf
6. G-ALGJ at Hendon 21-7-51: https://www.flickr.com/photos/dwhitworth/5505684168/
7. http://www.planetrace.co.uk/1950-1959_26.html

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
21-Jan-2015 21:33	Dr. John Smith	Added
25-Feb-2020 13:15	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Time, Location, Destination airport, Source, Narrative]
09-Sep-2020 21:44	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Narrative]