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All five crew members were killed in the crash including four members of the Royal Canadian Airforce (RCF). At the time details of the accident were not published听 - the remains of the aircraft were quickly cleared away by RAF investigators and the event became nothing more than a hazy memory.

However, in the mid 1990s a father and son team from Lanarkshire, John and Paul Reilly, began searching for the aircraft and two years ago Paul found some aluminium remnants on the moorside: "It was a very odd feeling. Pieces of a machine that really didn't belong there in the middle of a moor, in a lovely picturesque area, were lying just below the ground."

Walkers may come across the memorial on the moor.

A stone monument now marks the site of the crash which lies between Ilkley Moor and Addingham Moorside, not that far away from the famous 'Swastika Stone'. A plaque on the monument records the loss of the plane, a Handley Page Halifax bomber with the serial number DK185 belonging to RAF Bomber Command's 1664 Heavy Conversion Unit along with the names of the dead airmen. Pilot Officer Donald McLeod lost his life in the crash along with Robert Rahn, Lewis Riggs, William King, George Martin and Albert Mullen.

Sergeant Felix Byrne, flight engineer on the Halifax, was John Reilly's best friend. He originally survived the crash. Paul says: "It seems to have been a navigation exercise. They'd听 taken off at some point during the day and became lost. One of the witnesses we found spoke of one of the crew still being alive and through a process of elimination we reckon this was Felix Byrne, the only RAF member of the crew, who told his rescuers they were trying to find Yeadon airfield. It looks as though they'd been lost and they had come down through the clouds to try and find where they were and hit the hillside."

Bomb aimer Robert Rahn was 22 when he died in the crash. His brother Kenneth recollects the words of the telegram that brought the news of Robert's death: "Deeply regret to advise you that your son Sergeant Robert Henry Rahn was killed on active service overseas, January 31st. Please accept my profound sympathy. RCF Casualties Office."

The memorial stone

For Kenneth the memorial service is a chance to say farewell to his brother: "I really want to talk to him if I can but I can't. I can just say something and hope he hears me because you know we were so close. I know we did things for each other. We lived on a farm, worked together on a farm. Dad had a shoe store at the time. We worked at both places. He enjoyed life to the full and for him to depart like he did was a real blow to my mother and father."

The memorial plaque asks people passing by on the moor to spare a thought for those who lost their lives: "When you go home, tell them of us and say, for your tomorrow we gave life today".

In January 2006 friends and relatives of the air crew returned to the site of the tragedy to dedicate a memorial to those who lost their lives.