Product Description

This study of aircraft crashes on hills and mountains of the UK and Ireland covers the period 1928 to 1992, the majority relating to World War II. Drawing upon Air Force records, civil accident reports and news reports, the author has included the accounts of survivors, eye-witnesses and rescuers.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #637822 in Books
• Published on: 1995-06-21
• Format: Illustrated
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

Customer Reviews

Combines the facts with sensitivity
As my Polish father, Jozef Piasecki, is one of the pilots featured, this book is of special interest to me. I found the tragic stories of these wartime crashes, to be full of facts that must have entailed a great deal of research. At the same time, the book has been written with sympathy. There is no exageration or sensationalism. Simply a well thought out reference work, tempered with stories from locals and aircrew.

Diabolical
Although on an interesting subject, this is stylistically one of the worst-written books I have ever read. It is riddled with topographic errors (Cross Fell is not in the 'Western Pennine Region', whatever that might be), repetition, melodramatic hyperbole and sentimentality, which ruin otherwise straightforward, factual accounts. If ever a book needed an editor, then this is it. Check out Ron Collier's two volumes on Dark Peak air crashes to see what a difference a competent author makes of similar material.

PS For the author's information, anyone who can read a map will know that Cross Fell is in the North Pennines (ie in Cumbria) whereas the West Pennines, in as much as the term is recognised, are in Lancashire. Certainly the Ordnance Survey think so.