FORTY years ago today I was standing in the newsroom of the Warrington Examiner, whom I had just joined, when I experienced for the first time the drama of the breaking story.

What would normally have been the last of several editions of one of the five evening papers in the area arrived in the office with a dramatic announcement in its stop press.

Manchester United, on their way home from Belgrade, had crashed at Munich; players whom I had watched at an initially bombed-out Old Trafford since 1952, were known to be dead.

It so happened that I would be going to Manchester that night - for a show at the Opera House - and by the time we arrived at Greengate Arches you could actually feel the sense of shock.

The atmosphere was even more electric in the theatre where it fell to comedian Max Bygraves to draw laughter from 2,500 people. He was magnificent - though the biggest reaction came when he was able to announce that Matt Busby had survived. People simply stood up and clapped.

I didn't know it at the time but the evening was even more poignant for the theatre manager Tommy Appleby. A keen United fan, he had actually secured a ticket to fly with the team and only a last-minute hitch prevented him from making the trip.

Years later, when I was invited into his office, I found the walls adorned not only with pictures of the stars but also the "Busby Babes."

Within days I had moved to the GUARDIAN while Jimmy Murphy, the United assistant manager, was trying to get a team together.

First man to volunteer to play for them - and for nothing - was Stan Crowther, Aston Villa's hard man who had helped to beat the Reds at Wembley eight months earlier; the second was Mike Pinner, the amateur goalkeeper, whose relation, Fred, would work with later in life and who was one of the kindest, people I ever knew.

Converted for the new archive on 13 March 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.