Shackleton Park, Smithton

Do you know where Shackleton Park can be found?  Do you know why it is called Shackleton Park and what actually happened there?

P5SH were lucky enough to have a visit from Flight Lieutenant Andy Creswell from 120 Squadron at RAF Lossiemouth to tell us more about a very unique story that happened right here in Smithton.

Sixty years ago, on the evening of 10th January 1964, a Shackleton aircraft from RAF Kinloss took off on a mission from Kinloss over to Northern Ireland.  Shortly into the journey, as it approached Inverness, one of the engines caught fire and actually fell off the wing!  The plane got into real difficulty, but with great skill the pilot and his crew managed to land the plane safely in a field at Smithton.  Miraculously, all crew members managed to escape the wreckage unhurt and no members of the public were endangered.  The crew members were then taken to the Green Hall where they were looked after by some of the locals from Smithton.

This really is an amazing story!  Although it happened a long time ago, it is great that we can still learn about it today.

Flight Lieutenant Creswell told us all about the Shackleton air crash, and he also described the interesting work that RAF 120 Squadron do today with their Poseidon P-8 aircraft.  The class then visited Shackleton Park to look at the crash site.

Here are some of our thoughts:

“It was really cool having a visit from the RAF and to learn about the Shackleton plane crash.”  (Ria)

“I liked doing the treasure hunt because it gave me lots of info about the crash.”  (Brody)

“What surprised me was when we were told that everybody survived the crash”.  (Leo)

“It was a fun trip, and I liked it when our visitor told us everything that he did in his job.” (Xander)