The Jet Provost crashed on the 14th of September 1966 after flying into high ground in
bad weather near Newgate Bank, on Rievaulx Moor, but known locally as Roppa Moor. The pilot was a member of the Royal Navy and was on a
familiarization flight with the RAF. At the time of impact he was on a low level sortie and was flying in a south-north direction prior to the crash.
He flew into the moor and did not eject, he was killed instantly. The resulting fireball set fire to a large area of moorland which took two and a half hours
to get under control. The aircraft was removed from the moor and taken to Linton on Ouse for
detailed examination.
The aircraft was built to contract KC/E.041 by B.A.C. at Luton and was delivered to 1 FTS on 3rd May 1962. It suffered Cat. 5/FA(s)
in the above incident.
Pilot - Sub Lt Derek Clark Breen (Royal Navy), aged 21 of Washington, Co Durham, killed. He was attached to HMS Heron.
A Middlesbrough Evening Gazette photograph of the crash site.
What is belived to be the same area in 2007.
One peice which could well be from this aircraft, I suspect that the large fire after the crash burnt off all the surrounding
heather and as a result all remaining wreckage was easily spotted and collected for removal. The one peice shown was found by
John Skinn after numerous failed attempts by the two of us to locate anything; whilst itself not a crash site its almost certainly from the aircraft
John and myself searched a wide area of the moor in August 2003, I had been given afew clues as to where the aircraft had come down although not an exact location. We did locate a pile of stone / cairn which was not visible from any path across the moor and did not appear to be too old, a crater is also close by but appears to have been made by a bomb rather than an aircraft. Can anyone tell me why the pile of stones is here? Is it the place where the aircraft crashed? The stones do not form a boundary, is not a way marker, is not ancient.. or any of the usual reasons for a pile of stones.
