It is an event etched in the memory of a generation: the air crash that claimed the lives of 23 people, among them some of the country’s biggest footballing heroes.

Now, almost half a century after the plane carrying the Manchester United team home smashed on to the outskirts of Munich airport, its most famous living survivor has broken his silence on the tragedy.

Sir Bobby Charlton reveals today in The Times how he still thinks daily about the harrowing events of February 6, 1958, and the memories make him cry. Some of the scenes of death and devastation, he says, cannot ever be described, but he finally feels able to speak in detail about the fateful day.

Reliving the moment when, after two aborted take-off attempts, the twin-engine airliner finally sped down the runway, Sir Bobby said: “It was taking so long to get off the ground, and I suddenly realised that everyone felt the same. Then it went really quiet, and as I looked out of the window we hit a fence. We knocked it flat, and then everyone knew this was really serious.”

There were few cries or shouting, but a lot of mechanical noise, according to Sir Bobby, who was knocked unconscious as the plane began to break into pieces. A quarter of an hour later he came round, still strapped into his seat but 50 yards from the wreckage of the fuselage, having been dragged to safety by his team-mate Harry Gregg. The thought that he survived, while many friends died, still haunts him now as it did in the immediate aftermath. “We were all such friends . . . I couldn’t understand how I could have been 50 yards away from the aeroplane, still strapped in my seat, without suffering anything but a bang on my head. How could that be? How could I feel myself all over and find out that I was all right, completely whole, and my pals were dead? . . . I think about this every day of my life.

“And you know, you feel a bit guilty. I do feel guilty, even now, even as I say this.”

For Sir Bobby, who was 20 at the time, some memories remain too painful to revisit. Others have spoken of seeing mutilated bodies lying in the snow, Matt Busby, the team’s manager, moaning and clutching his chest, team-mate Roger Byrne sitting, dead, nearby and Jackie Blanchflower’s right arm almost severed. He will only add: “I looked round and saw injuries I will never describe.”

The first full account of Munich from Sir Bobby, who went on to become arguably England’s greatest footballer and the linchpin of the country’s 1966 World Cup winning team, was given for the publication today of the Manchester United Opus, an 850-page compendium charting the history of the club.

Speaking last night to The Times, Sir Bobby, 69, said: “Looking back on it now I know I was so lucky. It was one of the greatest tragedies in sport simply because this great team was on the threshold of being the best.”

The team of 1958, known as the Busby Babes, should have been among its most decorated and celebrated — the flight was en route home from a victory in the European Cup in Belgrade — but instead it has become a byword for the tragedy of youth cut off in its prime.

February 6, 1958: tragedy unfolds

• The British European Airways Elizabethan airliner landed in Munich for refuelling while bringing the team home from a victorious European Cup game in Yugoslavia
• Twice Captain James Thain tried to take off with snow and slush covering the runway, and twice he had to pull up as there seemed to be problems with the engines
• On the third attempt the aircraft went down the runway and picked up speed but, at 3.04pm local time, it failed to take off and careered off the runway
• The crash was found to have been caused by the build-up of slush towards the end of the runway, which meant the aircraft, above, could not get up enough speed to lift off