Date:	Sunday 21 November 1948
Time:	day
Type:	Percival P.31 Proctor Mk IV
Owner/operator:	Mrs Richarda Evelyn Morrow-Tait
Registration:	G-AJMU
MSN:	H.724
Fatalities:	Fatalities: 0 / Occupants: 2
Other fatalities:	0
Aircraft damage:	Destroyed
Location:	30 miles South West of Tok Junction, Tanana Valley, AK -   United States of America
Phase:	En route
Nature:	Demo/Airshow/Display
Departure airport:	Anchorage, AK
Destination airport:	Northway, AK

Narrative:
Percival P.31 Proctor Mk IV G-AJMU: Richarda Evelyn "Dikki" Morrow-Tait and her navigator Michael Townsend left Cambridge on 18 August 1948 in this Proctor - ex NP353 - for an eastward flight around the world. She named the aircraft "Thursday's Child" (who "has far to go" in the nursery rhyme "Monday's Child"). It just so happened that Richarda Morrow-Tait was born on 22 November 1923 - a Thursday!

Written off (destroyed) when crashed 21 November 1948 30 miles South West of Tok Junction, Tanana Valley, Alaska, USA. According to one source (see link #9):

"The sub-zero temperatures caused the plane’s carburetors to fail and Richarda was forced to make a crash landing. The army plane that was following behind dropped emergency supplies whilst the Alaska Highway Patrol went to rescue Richarda and Michael. They were unharmed but the plane? It lay in ruins. The landing gear and the wings were practically not even there anymore. It was, to be frank, a terrible 25th birthday. With money running out, a despondent Richarda later recalled: “What I need for a birthday present is a miracle.”

As reported at the time in a contemporary local newspaper (Oakland Tribune, Volume 149, Number 145, 22 November 1948):

"TRICK SAVES WOMAN IN ALASKA AIR CRASH
FAIRBANKS, Alaska, Nov. 22.(JP)
An old bush pilot trick paid off for Mrs. Monrow-Tait and her navigator, Michael Townsend, yesterday when they made a crash landing, uninjured, 200 miles southeast of here. The trick is to follow a highway in case of need of an emergency landing. The young British aviatrix had been experiencing engine trouble for several days prior to her takeoff other leg of her round-the-world flight. So, she followed the Glenn Highway, which heads northeast to a junction with the Alaska Highway. Her plane crashed near the road 30 miles southwest of Tok Junction in 30-below zero weather. The AT-7, a two-engine Beechcraft which was accompanying her on a planned hop to Northway, near the Canada-Alaska line, few to Tanacross, about 20 miles northwest of Tok, and reported the mishap. The Alaska highway patrol sent a truck down the road, picked up the fliers who had been walking around the plane and took them to Tanacross. Weather permitting, the Beechcraft will take the couple back to Anchorage today, or it may go to Fairbanks if the weather is better in that direction.

Today is Mrs. Morrow-Tait's 25th birthday. Several days ago, she said she hoped to be in Montreal to celebrate it. Witnesses said the right wing and landing gear-of the second-hand Royal Air Force plane were damaged".

Undaunted by this incident, Mrs. Morrow-Tait raised money for a replacement, Vultee Valiant NX54084, (named "Next Thursday's Child" as a reference to the wrecked Proctor) and she and her navigator managed to complete the flight, landing at Croydon on 19 August 1949, after one year and one day from when they took off.

Upon completing her journey Richarda Morrow-Tait became the first woman to pilot an aircraft round-the-world. She received little acclaim for her feat, and even a bit of ridicule from a public that felt she had abandoned her motherly duties for an unnecessary adventurous undertaking. Richarda lamented, "I had more trouble on the ground than I ever had in the air." She faded from publicity maintaining her pilot's licence into 1960.

Until 2022 Morrow-Tait was the youngest woman pilot to circumnavigate the globe. As of 2024, she remains the youngest woman pilot to circumnavigate the globe with a navigator. In 2024, a blue plaque was placed at Cambridge City Airport in honour of the 75th anniversary of her flight around the world.

She passed away on December 17, 1982 aged 59 from an incurable blood disease.

Tok Junction is a census-designated place (CDP) in Southeast Fairbanks Census Area, Alaska, United States. Tok lies on a large, flat alluvial plain of the Tanana Valley between the Tanana River and the Alaska Range at an important junction of the Alaska Highway (Alaska Route 2) with the Glenn Highway (Alaska Route 1). These locations are close to where G-AJMU came down.

1. Oakland Tribune, Volume 149, Number 145, 22 November 1948: https://cdnc.ucr.edu/?a=d&d=OT19481122.1.3&srpos=300&e=18-10-1948-31-12-1949--en--20--281-byDA-txt-txIN-Plane+crash----1948---
2. https://cwsprduksumbraco.blob.core.windows.net/g-info/HistoricalLedger/G-AJMU.pdf
3. https://www.airhistory.net/photo/708122/G-AJMU
4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richarda_Morrow-Tait#Round-the-world_flight
5. Stinson, Patrick M. (2011). Around-the-World Flights: A History. McFarland. pp. 185–7. ISBN 978-0786462827
6. https://www.wingnet.org/rtw/RTW003Z.HTM
7. https://marshallgroup.com/en/news-stories/cambridge-pays-tribute-to-the-first-woman-to-fly-around-the-world
8. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c9v8e1nkxwyo
9. https://www.ickleton.org.uk/ipsgallery/images/d1621.pdf
10. https://openplaques.org/people/30129
11. https://thenetletter.net/?view=article&id=3174:women-in-aviation-1419&catid=210
12. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tok,_Alaska#Geography

Built by F Hills & Sons, Manchester for the RAF as Proctor NP353. First UK civil registered (C of R 11434/1) as G-AJMU (C of A 9259) on 31 March 1947 to Field Aircraft Services. Croydon, Surrey. Not re-registered to Mrs Morrow-Tait (although she was flying the aircraft at the time of the above incident; presumably the aircraft was hired or leased and not bought, and therefore there was no need to re-register). Registration G-AJMU cancelled by the Secretary of State, Air Ministry on 21 November 1948 as \\\\\\\"crashed\\\\\\\"

Date/time	Contributor	Updates
31-May-2023 17:22	Cobar	Added
31-May-2023 17:23	Cobar	Updated
14-Jul-2025 01:16	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Time, Operator, Location, Source, Embed code, Narrative, Category, ]
14-Jul-2025 01:17	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Embed code, Narrative, ]
14-Jul-2025 01:18	Dr. John Smith	Updated [Narrative, ]