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On the 22nd of December we left the island to spend Christmas in Belfast and New Year in Ayrshire. We normally leave the dogs at my parents house in Stevenston before flying over to Belfast and this year was no different. However, the trip up the M6/M74 from Heysham was slightly different. Usually it’s non-stop, but this year we stopped for a few minutes at Sherwood Crescent.

At a point in time 20 years, 30 hours and 40 minutes before when we arrived, Sherwood Crescent was like any other street in Scotland, with families getting ready for Christmas, perhaps just sitting down to dinner. Five minutes later the majority of the Pan-Am Boeing 747 “Clipper Maid of the Seas” would impact 13 Sherwood Crescent killing all 259 on board and 11 on the ground.

Sherwood Crescent is in Lockerbie, Scotland – a name that has become synonymous for both the worst loss of life in an air disaster on British soil, and one of the most complicated legal trials under Scots law.

The images at the time showed the massive destruction caused by the remains of a 747 fuelled for a transatlantic flight. The cockpit section lying in a field near Tundergarth must be one of the defining media images of the 20th century. These images shown on the TV the next day are etched in my mind, and along with Challenger, Piper Alpha and the Herald of Free Enterprise are probably amongst the first real human tragedies I was aware of.

A few months before, for my 10th birthday, we had been plane spotting at Glasgow Airport, and it was the first time I’d seen a 747 up close. They were, and still are, quite rare at Glasgow and the noise and power were quite awesome. At the time it seemed to have all the power in the world, a machine that was clearly greater than the sum of its parts. It seemed invincible.

Yet here were the remains of the cockpit and first class section severed from the fuselage and lying in a field. It is reported that the flight attendant in this section was still alive after the impact, but died before any help arrived.

The images of the cockpit section capture both the ability of mankind to engineer something remarkable, something awe-inspiring like the 747, and also sadly the ability to cause unbelievable harm and destruction to others. One had hoped such a sight would not be seen again…