Campbell's Bluebird will 'roar into life' this summer
Thursday 22 February 2018 11:41, UK
Jim Old, Sky News Producer
Donald Campbell was travelling at over 300mph in his jet-powered hydroplane Bluebird K7 when disaster struck.
The boat's nose lifted gracefully from the surface of Cumbria's Coniston Water and it took off, performing a perfect airborne loop. Then it smashed into the surface. With plenty of momentum still to lose, it cartwheeled down the lake before coming to a rest in a shower of spray and debris. It bobbed there for a moment and then sank.
In the preceding decade, Bluebird had broken the water speed record seven times. Its daredevil skipper was a British Boys’ Own hero, celebrated pin-up and international icon.
But he had died instantly in that initial impact and it seemed the Bluebird story was over. It was 4 January 1967. The boat and the body of its pilot would be lost in the sunless depths of Coniston Water for 34 years.
Campbell's death shocked the world. Photographers and TV cameras had captured the disaster. The footage and images were flashed around the globe.
He had a massive worldwide following especially in the US and Australia where he'd raised the water and land speed records on lakes and salt flats.
To this day he remains the only person to set records on both land and water within a year.
In the period before the space race caught the public's imagination, speed record setting was front page news and Campbell's exploits were a source of huge national pride.
The violence of his death created a "JFK moment". Everyone old enough to understand its significance would remember where they were when they heard about it.
Thirty years after the crash, Bill Smith was moping after being dumped by his girlfriend. He was listening to the Marillion track Out of This World and for the first time he paid attention to the lyrics.
The song is an ode to Donald Campbell's bravery. Smith was too young to remember the accident and says he wasn't really aware of Campbell or the Bluebird story before that day.
But now his interest was piqued. He did his research. He was a wreck-diver and here was a wreck just waiting to be dived. He just had to find it, a process which took him and his friends over four years. They discovered Bluebird in October 2000, sitting upright on the lake bed, its rear section remarkably undamaged. There was no sign of her skipper.
Once found, Bluebird couldn't be un-found. The news hit the international press within hours and the interest was enormous. The people of Coniston were worried their famous wreck would be stripped by souvenir-hunting divers. Campbell's daughter Gina gave Smith her permission to remove Bluebird from the lake.
The smashed remains of Bluebird K7 broke the surface of Coniston Water in March 2001. Gina Campbell then gave Smith an instruction: "Now, find my dad."
The violence of his death created a "JFK moment". Everyone old enough to understand its significance would remember where they were when they heard about it.
Smith had carefully mapped Bluebird's debris-field on the bed of Coniston Water. He called in an air crash expert who examined the wreck and the map and predicted with unnerving accuracy where he thought the body might lie.
In May 2001 Donald Campbell's remains were located and taken out of the lake. An inquest found he'd been decapitated in the crash by Bluebird's windscreen. He was buried in Coniston's cemetery.
Controversy hung around the wreck of Bluebird K7. She was too historically significant to scrap. Some wanted to put it on display in its broken state but Gina Campbell was against it.
Smith, who'd moved the boat to his Tyneside workshop, came up with a plan. He and his team would rebuild Bluebird K7 to working condition. It would no longer break records but it would have one last high-speed blast on water before being put on permanent display in Coniston's Ruskin Museum.
Sky News has had exclusive behind the scenes access to the rebuilding of Bluebird K7 since 2007. We have witnessed the extraordinary attention to detail the team of volunteers have employed.
In its record breaking days, K7 was regularly tweaked and modified. The Bluebird Project team is trying to restore it to the exact condition it was in as it pulled away from the jetty for the last time in January 1967.
Outside the project, some have expressed frustration at the length of time the rebuild has taken. Others have speculated the job would never be finished. But for the last decade, Sky News has witnessed nothing but unstinting dedication and slow but steady progress.
Now K7 is all but complete and the team are painting its hull in iconic "Bluebird blue" paint. It has a working jet engine and only awaits a brand new cockpit canopy.
This August, Donald Campbell's Bluebird K7 will roar into life again and the next chapter in its astonishing story will begin.