Donald Campbell’s Bluebird K7 to return to Lake District’s Coniston after 20-year battle

Donald Campbell’s Bluebird K7 is to return to the Lake District’s Coniston after a 20-year battle.

The Bluebird K7 hydrofoil in which record-breaker Donald Campbell was killed will be sent to a museum in the North West village after a legal wrangle over its future.

Campbell died in 1967 at the age of 45 when the K7 flipped and disintegrated at 300mph on Coniston Water during an attempt to set a new water speed record.

The wreck and his remains were salvaged 34 years later in 2001, with the debris later becoming the centre of a dispute between Campbell’s family, who wanted to hand the Bluebird to a Lake District museum, and Bill Smith, the engineer behind its restoration, who wanted to restore it and use it around the world.

The boat will now be displayed in the Ruskin Museum, having been restored by a team of volunteers in Newcastle over 23 years since its recovery.