Pilot crashed seeking ‘phantom’ airfield

 A pilot crashed his light aircraft after his navigation system directed him to an airfield that did “not appear to exist”.

The 53-year-old man was attempting to fly to a landing strip near Alford, Aberdeenshire, last June, directed by his Garmin GPS navigation device, according to the Air Accidents Investigation Branch (AAIB).

But he could not see anywhere to land and lost control after conducting three circuits of the area. The plane plummeted to the ground but both the pilot and his passenger survived.

Garmin told investigators the location was “not in the current database” for its devices. The AAIB said: “The airfield the pilot was attempting to locate does not appear to exist.”