Mark Peacock and Judy Laidler

Mark Peacock and his girlfriend Judy Laidler were flying from Peterborough to Inverness in Scotland for what was supposed to be a pleasant weekend break. The country is better known for its stunning mountain ranges and beautiful scenery than it is for its weather, with snow and ice being very common. During the flight, pilot Stephen Broughton decided to fly as low as possible to avoid ice building up on the wings, even though visibility wasn’t great in the area it seemed like the best option due to how cold it was.

After emerging from a cloud the pilot found himself heading straight for the side of a mountain, and after quickly shouting to his passengers to hold on, prepared to make impact. This crash has to go down as one of the biggest flukes in history, as even though pieces of the aircraft were later found by rescuers up to one mile away, the four people on board were almost unharmed. A few small cuts and bruises but no broken bones or serious injuries, and all four of them walked out of the twisted wreckage in one piece.

Speaking later at a conference at the Aberdeen Royal Infirmary, Mr Peacock said of the crash:

“It was very quick, very painful, very violent,” with him admitting he was “just glad to be alive”.

When asked how they thought they survived the couple put all credit onto the pilot for bringing down the plane safely, but also stated “The only thing I feel at the moment is luck. I feel it is an absolute fluke and nothing but.”

Unfortunately, the unusually safe landing was only the start of their troubles as everyone on board was dressed in casual town clothing, and they now found themselves 3000 ft up a Scottish mountain in a blizzard. The group walked down the slope as far as they could but quickly found the priority was to get out of the wind.

The group built a small snow shelter by scooping out a ditch and trying to push snow into a small wall to block some of the wind. Their efforts weren’t enough and even huddling together for warmth didn’t help much, and it was at this point Mr Peacock thought he might actually die on the mountain.

Luckily for the group the flight was expected and a rescue party was quickly dispatched when it didn’t show up. Since the plane crashed directly along its course it didn’t take long for the search team to find them, and after just 3 hours from when they first crashed they were found and taken to safety. Apart from a few small wounds all four of them were quite well and only spent a couple of days in hospital.