ON a bleak November morning in 1940 trainee pilot Harold Penketh plunged to his death while on a training flight.

His Spitfire went nose first into the Cambridgeshire Fenland before exploding in hundreds of pieces.

The young pilot's body was pulled from the wreckage and his remains were brought back to Brighton where he was buried cremated at Woodvale Cemetery.

But the Spitfire was left to sink into the bog - a forgotten relic of the Second World War.

That was until yesterday morning - when a team of archaeologists began work to excavate the fighter plane.

Jo Dickson, from the Wildlife Trust who manage the land, said progress had been "very good" in the field near Holme, despite the wet weather.

She said: "They now know for sure the Spitfire is there which is good news and they have started to bring out the first smaller artefacts which look to be fragments of the plane.

"They are certainly ahead of schedule at the moment."

The dig is estimated to last a week with experts hoping to bring out the main fuselage on Wednesday or Thursday with a flypast scheduled for Thursday at 3pm.

Those behind the excavation are now trying to track down descendants of the pilot who they think could be in Brighton and Hove.

Not much is known about the 20-year-old who had only recently trained on Spitfires.

Born in Hove to James and Ann Penketh, prior to the war he worked in insurance for the The Ocean Accident and Guarantee Corporation.

He joined 266 Squadron of the Royal Air Force and was based at RAF Wittering near Peterborough.

Pilot officer Penketh had just 13 hours experience on Spitfires when he set out on the doomed training flight over Cambridgeshire.

Eyewitnesses reported that he performed a battle climb up to 28,000ft without any apparent problem before plummeting towards the earth.

His aircraft partially recovered at around 2,000ft but then re-entered a dive and struck the ground vertically.

He made no attempt to bail out and was killed on impact.

Investigations concluded that there had either been a failure of the oxygen system or another problem with the aircraft.

His obituary in his work magazine, published shortly after his death, read: "He was of a charming disposition and his loss was keenly felt by those who knew him.”

He was buried in Brighton’s Woodvale Crematorium. However, in December 1940 the funeral directors (probably on request of his family) asked for his remains to be removed.

His name is now on the memorial to the dead in City Ceremony, Bear Road.

Are you a descendant of Harold Penketh? Call 01273 544536 or email news@theargus.co.uk.