Five hours after the crash they found me caught under a wheel, says Munich survivor Morgans

By IAN RIDLEY

Last updated at 21:09 02 February 2008

Kenny Morgans was never

one of the greatest names of

Manchester United's vivid red

history. But on a dark and

snowy afternoon, 50 years ago

this coming Wednesday, he was

caught up in the tragedy that became a

touchstone for the most famous football club

in the world.

What happened on an icy Munich runway

at 3.04pm on February 6, 1958, has been told

many times and from many angles.

The bare facts are these. Eight United

players and three club officials died, along

with eight football journalists, two of the

crew of the chartered British European

Airways Elizabethan aircraft, a United

supporter and a Yugoslav travel agent on

what was the third attempt to take off after

a refuelling stop in Bavaria on the way home

from Belgrade, where Sir Matt Busby's team

had overcome Red Star on aggregate to

reach a European Cup semi-final.

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Morgans, then a babe among Busby's

babes, was just 18. Not long settled in digs in

Manchester, after leaving his home town of

Swansea, he had forced his way into the first

team just six weeks earlier.

He survived the

air crash and, as he approaches this week's

sorrowful anniversary, his extraordinary

account of his escape is at once

frightening, humbling and poignant.

"Years ago it was difficult to talk

about Munich but it's getting better,"

says Morgans. "Everyone wants to

hear about the team that died. The

weather was terrible. It was snowing

and windy and I remember looking

out of the window and they were

cleaning all the ice off the wings.

"The third time we tried to take off

I was sitting by the window, in the

middle of the plane. We were going

really fast and I could remember the

plane hitting the fence at the end of

the runway. That was the end of it. I

lost consciousness."

He recounts the next

amazing sequence of

that terrible Thursday

simply from what was

recounted to him.

"About 8.30 or 8.45pm,

two German reporters went back to

the burning plane and they found me.

I was still there. I was the last to

come out. I was caught underneath a

wheel. They got me to hospital and I

didn't wake up until Sunday morning.

I had a cut head and a lot of bruising.

I had lost 10 pints of blood.

"I remember waking up and there

was Bobby Charlton, Albert Scanlon,

Ray Wood and myself. We had

breakfast and everybody was quiet. I

thought the other boys must have

been in another room.

"Then the professor of the hospital

sat with me on Sunday afternoon and

told me the players who had died and

the players who were very sick

upstairs. There was the boss, Matt,

and there was Duncan [Edwards]

and there was Johnny Berry, the

right-winger whose position I took.

They weren't in a good way. It was

unbelievable."

Many of the survivors and relatives

are willing to share their memories

of the crash and its aftermath. They

acknowledge its power and place not

only in their lives but in that of a city

and a country plunged into shock.

Sandy Busby, son of the founder of

the modern Old Trafford dynasty,

recalls how it was the day of his 22nd

birthday and he received a telegram

from his father saying sorry that he

could not be there.

Young Busby was on the books of

Blackburn Rovers and, returning

from training, an early evening

newspaper bill at Manchester's

Victoria Station sent a chill through

him. The bill read 'United In Plane

Crash' and Busby telephoned home.

"An auntie of mine was down from

Scotland, staying with my mum," he

recalls. "She answered and she was

frantic. She said: 'Sandy, get home'."

When the taxi dropped him off, he

walked into a house full of worried

relatives. The wife of Frank Swift,

the former Manchester City keeper

who was by then a Sunday paper

reporter, was there, along with the

girlfriend of another journalist.

"They thought the Busbys

would be hearing things

first," says Sandy. "Then it

came through that Frank had died. A

little later we heard this player had

died, then that player had died. My

mother went into a semi-coma.

"She was just sitting there

staring into the fireplace. I went

upstairs and was sat on the bed

saying a prayer when my

uncle rushed in saying,

'Sandy, he's alive — he's

alive!' My mum got my

sister and me to go out and

start visiting other people's

houses, some of the players, to see

that their families were OK."

Jean Busby also went out to

Munich, not just to be with her

husband but to visit the survivors.

Manchester City staff were also

out visiting worried United

families that night and in the

days following.

It was many

months before a reluctant Sir Matt

was fit enough to resume his

leadership of the club and he had to

rely on his rock and unsung hero of

United, assistant manager Jimmy

Murphy, who had missed the Munich

trip because, as Wales coach, he

was preparing the team for an

international.

Murphy, revered by all who worked

with him, travelled to Munich to

bring back goalkeeper Harry Gregg

and centre-half Bill Foulkes, the only

two players to emerge relatively

unscathed. They returned by train

and boat.

Murphy's son, Jimmy

junior, then 15 and one of six

children, says: "I think he

was closer to the players

than his own family. He

used to call them his

little apples.

"The only time

my father got

emotional was if

anyone asked him

how good Duncan

Edwards was."

It is a theme

that runs through

the testimony of

all.

Edwards, a

towering, powerful wing-half made

his debut for United as an amateur at

16 and was an England international

at 18, then the youngest ever. "He was

just sensational,"' says Sir Bobby

Charlton. "He was as hard as nails. He

was a long time fighting before he

died."

It was 15 days, in fact. Edwards was

just 21 and he and Charlton were best

friends. The boy from the Black

Country and the Geordie did National

Service together and shared rooms

together.

"The enormity of it all was

so dreadful," says Charlton. "We were

going into the most exciting stages of

our careers."

The detail of some of the stories

is almost unbearable. Jackie

Blanchflower was read the last rites

but survived. Eddie Colman did not

and his possessions were sent home

to his father. They included a paper

bag containing an apple, an orange, a

quarter of a pound of tea and two

pounds of sugar that his mother had

packed for him.

Foulkes's story is another that

almost defies belief. Then a part-time

player who was also a miner, he

found himself strapped to his seat

and staring into a void after the

crash. The plane had split at his feet.

He recalls the plane's captain

rushing by, urging him to get out.

And so he did, wandering off into the

dark for some 50 yards until he

turned and saw the team's bloodied

goalkeeper, Gregg, carrying a baby,

still alive. Foulkes returned to see if

he, too, could help.

When a Volkswagen

van arrived on the

scene, Gregg and

Foulkes took up the

offer to jump in but

the shock of what

had happened overcame Foulkes.

Suffering a flashback as the van sped

away down the runway, Foulkes

berated and then hit the driver as he

urged him to slow down.

Foulkes's tale had a happy ending

when, at the age of 37, he was part of

Sir Matt's team who won the

European Cup by beating Benfica at

Wembley a decade later.

Forty years

on, though, he is still paying a price.

"It was great playing in Europe.

Flying didn't bother me at all," he

says. "Now, I can't do it."

None escaped emotionally.

Morgans was never the same player again and played only two

games the following season

before joining Swansea for

three years then quitting to run

a pub until he was persuaded to

turn out for Newport County in

the old Fourth Division.

Albert Scanlon struggled, too,

and two years later was sold to

Newcastle.

He admits there was

bitterness, shared by others in

the Munich aftermath, that the

club perhaps did not do enough to

help them through the

experience.

Scanlon, later a

docker and security guard, helped,

along with Gregg,

Morgans, Blanchflower

and Ray Wood to

organise a testimonial in

Munich in 1997.

"It paid some of my bills off, we

went on holiday with the kids and

had some alterations done to the

house," says Scanlon. "It didn't

change my life."

Scanlon believes there is more

sympathy and support around the

club now but he still has a legacy of

pain at his parting from United.

"I

still feel I was a better winger than

Bobby Charlton," he says. "But they

felt they had to get him in the

team. I think he understands."

Charlton remains the link

between the two eras. Now

United's revered ambassador,

he sat down recently with the

current first-team squad to

watch a video of the club's

history involving Munich, and

addressed them afterwards.

"It had a massive effect on the

players who maybe didn't know

as much as some of us," says

Ryan Giggs. "I grew up a United

fan so I knew the club's history

and heritage and the love and

affection there is for Sir Bobby and

Sir Matt."

Charlton would dearly love Sir

Alex Ferguson's team to go on and

mark the 50th anniversary of

Munich with another Champions

League title. "Alex would like it if 50

years later we could win the

European Cup. I think the players

would like it as well," says Charlton.

Ferguson was in a Glasgow library

when he heard of the Munich crash.

Now, 22 years into the job of being a

worthy carrier of the Busby torch,

with his belief in young players and a

passion for expansive, attacking

football, Ferguson admits that this

was always going to be an emotional

season.

But his side, who face

Olympique Lyonnais in the last 16

later this month, are capable of

marking the occasion by adding to

the European Cup they claimed

under him in 1999.

"It would be a tribute to a great

team," he says. "But you are a bit

afraid of it, worried that we might let

ourselves down."

Sentiment, though, will be a powerful

ally. Roman Abramovich and

Chelsea may want to go to Moscow in

May to win their first Champions

League title but few neutrals in this

of all seasons would surely begrudge

United their third.