Latest news with #Shetland
Yahoo
15 hours ago
- Yahoo
'I left Shetland to hunt whales in the Antarctic'
Gibbie Fraser was a teenager when he decided the best way to afford a motorbike like his friends on the west side of Shetland was to join the crew of a whaling vessel. Months later, at the age of 16, he was battling rough seas and violent storms in relentless pursuit of the largest animals on earth, 8,000 miles (13,000 km) from home in the South Atlantic ocean. Gibbie is one of several former Scottish whalers contributing to a new digital time capsule exploring the country's forgotten history in modern whaling. The Whalers' Memory Bank, launched in Dundee, aims to capture a snapshot of life onboard the whale-catching vessels around South Georgia and Antarctica between 1904 and 1965. "It was the highlight of my life," said Gibbie, who is chairman of the Shetland ex-Whalers Association. "I knew boys who had gone before and they came home the following summer with really nice motorcycles and I thought 'that's the way to do it'. "It was an adventure and when you are young, it is like a bit of a drug." 50 years on: Scots whaling recalled Now 83, he was among hundreds of Scots who joined boats along with largely Norwegian crew in the post-war years, when work was scarce. Many, like him, had grown up in small, coastal communities on Shetland, while others came from the Leith, in Edinburgh. The Edinburgh-based firm, Christian Salvesen, operated whale processing ports at the aptly named Leith Harbour at Stromness Bay in South Georgia, a British overseas territory about 870 miles (1,400 km) from the Falkland Islands. Gunners would fire harpoons aimed at killing and capturing blue, fin and humpback whales, which were brought aboard and processed at a centre in the island's main settlement, Grytviken. Gibbie began his career cooking and serving meals for the crew and cleaning the boat as a mess boy in the late 1950s. As the only non-smoker, he would also be sent above deck to steer at night while shipmates stayed below to play cards for cigarettes. He remembered the conditions on board being hard, but said there was a sense of "camaraderie" among the crew. "The catchers were wonderful boats and came through a lot of heavy weather, but you never walked along the aft end along the main deck, you had to go via the lifeboat deck because the main deck was awash most of the time," he said. "When you were in bed, you were not far from where the gun platform was. You were about a foot-and-a-half from where the sea was. You could hear it rushing by. "And it was daylight right round the clock. If you were among whales, then you kept going, you never stopped. It was right around the clock until the whales had disappeared." On one occasion, he recalled pursuing a fin whale in straight line for four hours before it was eventually captured. He said he "felt sorry" for the whales that were caught, adding he never wanted to see them suffer. "I realise that it was a warm-blooded animal that could feel pain like I could, and probably fear too," he said. "You always hoped that when the harpoon went in, that would kill it, it was never nice to see it struggle for a while." Gibbie completed four seasons aboard the boats and was only prevented from returning for a fifth when he suffered an arm injury in a crash involving his motorbike and a school bus at home in Shetland. The industry began to crumble in the early-1960s against the backdrop of more stringent government regulation and early environmental campaigns against the killing of the animals. However, by that point, whale stocks had become so low that the practice was "no longer deemed economically viable". The Edinburgh-based firm, Christian Salvesen, wound down its whaling operations in 1963. It is estimated about 176,000 whales were slaughtered and processed in South Georgia between 1904 and 1965. Historian Dan Snow helped launch the memory bank aboard the RRS Discovery in Dundee. The boat was built in the city as a research vessel which ferried explorers Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton to the Antarctic in 1901. Dundee was centre of Scottish whaling throughout the 19th century when whale oil became an essential component for the softening of fabrics during jute production. Snow says elements of the Discovery's construction were inspired by the whaling vessels arriving in the city during that period. He told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland: "Discovery was an Antarctic survey vessel built in Dundee because it had that whaling expertise, built with all sorts of features that they learned from whaling ships. "It had things like rudders that lifted up into the hull and special strong hulls. "Through the memory bank, we've been able to save these stories, these testimonies about what it was like to go down there for months on end through the eternal summer of the Antarctic and chase whales, using world war two ships and radar equipment, it was like they were waging war on these whales." The memory bank has been produced by the South Georgia Heritage Trust and the South Georgia Museum. They worked with former whaling communities across Scotland to collect archive pictures and film, alongside several hundred items and oral histories and create a digital database, which can be viewed online. Helen Balfour, assistant curator of the museum, whose great-grandfather and grandfather were both whalers in South Georgia, said: "To understand more about what they saw, what they experienced and how they, their colleagues and families back home must have felt, is incredibly special. "It is amazing that over 60 years on from the whaling the camaraderie that exists between the whalers is just as strong." Whalers' Memory Bank
BBC News
16 hours ago
- General
- BBC News
Whaling Archive: 'I left Shetland to hunt whales in the Antarctic'
Gibbie Fraser was a teenager when he decided the best way to afford a motorbike like his friends on the west side of Shetland was to join the crew of a whaling later, at the age of 16, he was battling rough seas and violent storms in relentless pursuit of the largest animals on earth, 8,000 miles (13,000 km) from home in the South Atlantic is one of several former Scottish whalers contributing to a new digital time capsule exploring the country's forgotten history in modern Whalers' Memory Bank, launched in Dundee, aims to capture a snapshot of life onboard the whale-catching vessels around South Georgia and Antarctica between 1904 and 1965. "It was the highlight of my life," said Gibbie, who is chairman of the Shetland ex-Whalers Association."I knew boys who had gone before and they came home the following summer with really nice motorcycles and I thought 'that's the way to do it'."It was an adventure and when you are young, it is like a bit of a drug." Now 83, he was among hundreds of Scots who joined boats along with largely Norwegian crew in the post-war years, when work was like him, had grown up in small, coastal communities on Shetland, while others came from the Leith, in Edinburgh-based firm, Christian Salvesen, operated whale processing ports at the aptly named Leith Harbour at Stromness Bay in South Georgia, a British overseas territory about 870 miles (1,400 km) from the Falkland would fire harpoons aimed at killing and capturing blue, fin and humpback whales, which were brought aboard and processed at a centre in the island's main settlement, Grytviken. Gibbie began his career cooking and serving meals for the crew and cleaning the boat as a mess boy in the late the only non-smoker, he would also be sent above deck to steer at night while shipmates stayed below to play cards for remembered the conditions on board being hard, but said there was a sense of "camaraderie" among the crew."The catchers were wonderful boats and came through a lot of heavy weather, but you never walked along the aft end along the main deck, you had to go via the lifeboat deck because the main deck was awash most of the time," he said."When you were in bed, you were not far from where the gun platform was. You were about a foot-and-a-half from where the sea was. You could hear it rushing by."And it was daylight right round the clock. If you were among whales, then you kept going, you never stopped. It was right around the clock until the whales had disappeared." On one occasion, he recalled pursuing a fin whale in straight line for four hours before it was eventually said he "felt sorry" for the whales that were caught, adding he never wanted to see them suffer."I realise that it was a warm-blooded animal that could feel pain like I could, and probably fear too," he said."You always hoped that when the harpoon went in, that would kill it, it was never nice to see it struggle for a while." 'No longer viable' Gibbie completed four seasons aboard the boats and was only prevented from returning for a fifth when he suffered an arm injury in a crash involving his motorbike and a school bus at home in industry began to crumble in the early-1960s against the backdrop of more stringent government regulation and early environmental campaigns against the killing of the by that point, whale stocks had become so low that the practice was "no longer deemed economically viable".The Edinburgh-based firm, Christian Salvesen, wound down its whaling operations in is estimated about 176,000 whales were slaughtered and processed in South Georgia between 1904 and 1965. Historian Dan Snow helped launch the memory bank aboard the RRS Discovery in boat was built in the city as a research vessel which ferried explorers Robert Falcon Scott and Ernest Shackleton to the Antarctic in was centre of Scottish whaling throughout the 19th century when whale oil became an essential component for the softening of fabrics during jute says elements of the Discovery's construction were inspired by the whaling vessels arriving in the city during that period. He told BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland: "Discovery was an Antarctic survey vessel built in Dundee because it had that whaling expertise, built with all sorts of features that they learned from whaling ships."It had things like rudders that lifted up into the hull and special strong hulls."Through the memory bank, we've been able to save these stories, these testimonies about what it was like to go down there for months on end through the eternal summer of the Antarctic and chase whales, using world war two ships and radar equipment, it was like they were waging war on these whales." The memory bank has been produced by the South Georgia Heritage Trust and the South Georgia worked with former whaling communities across Scotland to collect archive pictures and film, alongside several hundred items and oral histories and create a digital database, which can be viewed Balfour, assistant curator of the museum, whose great-grandfather and grandfather were both whalers in South Georgia, said: "To understand more about what they saw, what they experienced and how they, their colleagues and families back home must have felt, is incredibly special."It is amazing that over 60 years on from the whaling the camaraderie that exists between the whalers is just as strong."
The Herald Scotland
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- The Herald Scotland
River City: The one where Bob and Angus recall good times
Soaps need a delicate touch at times, and if you can put a dash of wry humour in the mix so much the better. The Hilda scene, for instance, was preceded by Vera and Ivy conceding that Hilda, for all her faults, was a decent sort. The lightest of touches was on display tonight in River City. Yes, that River City, the Glesga-set soap that's wall to wall gangsters if you listen to its detractors. The one that will be no more after autumn next year. The scene involved Angus and Bob sitting on a couch. Nothing special. The pair have been best pals since Adam was a customer in the Oyster Cafe. They are the Likely Lads of River City. For Bob and Terry read Bob and Angus. Usually to be found bickering in the garage, occasionally they get something a little different to do. Context: last summer, Bob's fiancée Kim died. It was possibly the least showy death in soap history. She sat on a bench, she closed her eyes, and she went. She did get engaged minutes before, mind you, and she had recently been in a horrific car accident. Viewers were genuinely upset. Bob was left a single dad. Angus and his partner Amber are expecting their first child, an event the normally easy-going mechanic is finding hard to handle. All he wanted to do was watch a daft movie with his mate, but fate and darts intervened. "No more spontaneous karaoke sessions or nights out on the town,' said Angus. We never did any of that anyway, said Bob. And having a kid is exciting. 'As exciting as watching people trying to stop a shark from causing nuclear Armageddon?' 'Is it a great white?' 'A massive white.' "I'd say it's on a par.' Written by Emma Lennox, produced by Deb Charles and directed by Meg Campbell, it's a small scene yet says so much about what makes River City tick. There's a shared history here, a sense of humour that's in with the bricks. It takes years to build this kind of atmosphere, yet it can disappear in the flourish of a BBC executive's pen. River City has to go because it is not passing the value for money test, says BBC Scotland management. Compared to big hitters such as Shetland - average audience 700,000 in Scotland - River City isn't cutting it with just 200,000 viewers. Tell that to the viewers, many elderly, who have stuck with it through months of crazy scheduling. Tell that to the cast and crew who will be out of a job. No more karaoke sessions or nights on the town, right enough. What a shame.
BBC News
5 days ago
- General
- BBC News
Shetland woman celebrates 40 years as sub postmistress
When Kathleen Anderson was a young mum in the 1980s she converted her front porch into a post office. It meant she could earn a little extra money as a sub-postmistress while juggling caring for her four young daughters. Her role was a vital one in the remote Reawick area of Shetland, where local people depended on her for paying their pensions or their family allowance. Now a grandmother of 10 and "the wrong side of 70", Kathleen is celebrating 40 years as Reawick's sub-postmistress. She first opened her post office in June 1985 after former postmaster Peter Fraser died suddenly. She told BBC Scotland News: "I thought it would be a little extra money, because I was home here looking after children at the time."In those days most of the women around here weren't going out to work, because you couldn't, you had to drive too far and there were no childminders."Today, Kathleen continues to serve her remote community through the same hatch her brother-in-law built 40 years get her attention, customers walk through her front door and ring a bell next to her serving window. In this remote part of the Westside of Shetland, there are no pubs or shops and the nearest post office to Kathleen's is about 10 miles said: "It's very handy for folk in the community, sometimes I might get a customer that would pop in for a cup of tea".Her duties have changed significantly since she first opened four decades said: "It's not as busy now - at one time all the local pensioners came here for their pensions and anyone with a family came here for their family allowance."But that's no longer the case as everybody gets their money put into the bank." Kathleen has had to adapt to the introduction of the controversial Horizon IT system and the change in consumer said: "I suppose now there's more returns, folk ordering online and returning parcels, there's more of that now, that never was the case before."Over the years, the post office allowed Kathleen to maintain a career while "most of the young mothers in the area would have been doing knitting of some sort for a bit of extra income".Family has always been at the heart of Reawick post office. Kathleen brought up her children and later cared for her grandchildren part time while running the business. She said: "They used to love it. My youngest grandson would love sitting up here [by the hatch].""When the customers came in he would try to put their cards in the machine for them."Despite her many years of service, Kathleen has no intention of slowing down: "Well I'm over 70 and no I haven't had any thoughts of retiring yet."I thought when I was 70 it might be a good time to retire, but that didn't happen, then I thought 40 years of the post office – that would be a good time to retire, but, here I am and it's not happened yet.
Times
6 days ago
- Business
- Times
Leaving oil and gas in the ground was always a pipe dream
Just call me Mystic Mac. As I forecast in this space earlier this month, the UK has finally opened the door to the development of the Rosebank oilfield off Shetland and the Jackdaw gas field off Aberdeen. Ed Miliband, the net zero secretary, famously said that drilling in these two modest reserves would constitute 'climate vandalism'. Well, it looks like he will shortly have to get his spray paint out and daub 'Just Start Oil' on the door of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero. To be honest, it didn't take supernatural foresight to predict that these totemic fields would ultimately get the go-ahead. They were given licences by the last government. Production was halted only by a bizarre judgment by the Court of Session in Edinburgh. In January Lord Ericht ruled in favour of the climate activists, Uplift and Greenpeace, who argued that the UK government hadn't carried out a full environmental impact assessment of the emissions from the burning of fossil fuels downstream. It had merely provided an assessment of the carbon dioxide from the process of extracting it and piping it ashore. New methods of extraction can and are producing significant reductions in producer emissions. But the UK government had not formally included an assessment of the downstream emissions since it was deemed self-evident that burning hydrocarbons produces greenhouse gases. What did the court expect? That it would be used to oil bicycle chains and fill balloons? Shell says that Jackdaw alone would produce enough gas to heat 1.4 million households. The environmental and health impact on those households of withdrawing their main source of heating was not, of course, considered in this pettifogging ruling — because that would have required an ounce of common sense. Nor did the court recognise that the gas, which would have to be imported to fuel those domestic boilers if Jackdaw were stoppered, might produce more emissions than using our domestic supply. Yet it should be patently obvious that shipping liquefied natural gas 3,000 miles from America by tanker is more profligate in emissions than using what's produced by extraction from our backyard. The court was tacitly endorsing the perverse logic of the Scottish government and lobbyists such as Greenpeace that, in some morally inexplicable way, imported oil and gas is good while ours is bad. But Sir Keir Starmer was never going to start shutting down an industry that generates about £25 billion a year, according to Offshore Energy UK, and supports around 100,000 jobs. Pointlessly sacrificing these new fields would only have indicated to the few companies still operating in the region that the government is hell bent on closing down the North Sea prematurely. The new rules announced last week by Michael Shanks, the energy minister, will allow further development of the Cambo and Clair fields, expansion of which had also been placed on hold following the January court ruling. This whole episode served only to showcase the absurdity of what is being called the managerial 'lanyard class's' thinking about energy. The Treasury is not stupid and was never going to endorse an exercise in performative self-harm. Nor was No 10. 'Keeping it in the ground', as Patrick Harvie used to advocate, was not what Labour meant by a rational and measured transition to renewable energy. The UK depends on oil and gas for 75 per cent of its energy usage. So the UK government has rejigged the approval process to include a statement of the bleedin' obvious — viz, that burning oil and gas produces emissions. Industry sources believe, rightly, that by submitting this new and more politically correct prospectus, they will be able to go ahead. That is, if firms like Equinor haven't given up in disgust. They're already being hit by a 78 per cent profits tax on North Sea oil, which makes you wonder why they bother. It's not as if the oil price is exactly soaring right now, despite the nasty business in the Strait of Hormuz. Companies such as Harbour Energy have given up and pulled out. Norwegian-owned Equinor, in Rosebank, is hanging on, presumably in the hope that it will be well placed to bid for future wind farm development. It installed the first commercially viable floating wind farm, Hywind, off Peterhead. All of which underlines the lamentable state of our whole approach to energy. Oil companies, demonised by the environmental lobby, happen to possess the very skills and technology which will be needed if and when the green energy bonanza finally materialises. Greenpeace seems to think the wind energy in the North Sea can be harnessed by Native American dream-catchers and transmitted into people's homes by daisy chains. In fact it requires heavy-duty platforms, implanted in turbulent waters, to support wind turbines the size of the Eiffel Tower — and also the laying of undersea cables to get it to the grid (if it can be upgraded in time). This is not very different, technologically, from what fossil fuel companies have been doing for the past 50 years. Rosebank and Jackdaw are not going to solve the UK's strategic energy deficit. They are rather modest operations in a North Sea field that is in steep and irrevocable decline. The glory days are over. But we still need whatever they can provide, if only to ensure a measure of energy security and help reduce costly imports. One of the more specious arguments currently deployed by opponents of Rosebank and Jackdaw is that their hydrocarbons will be exported and are therefore of no use here. Not so: gas goes directly to the UK. Oil is mostly exported to Rotterdam for refining, but it comes back as petrol and other products. It isn't refined here because we've closed nearly all our own refineries, such as Grangemouth, because of our perverse belief that it is morally preferable to import hydrocarbons. Abandoning the North Sea won't bring forward net zero by a single day. It will merely increase our dependency on authoritarian governments in the Middle East, make energy bills even more unaffordable, and deprive the UK of billions in oil revenues to spend on the NHS. Predictably, the Scottish government has not responded to the energy U-turn. The SNP is still under the sway of environmental cretinism. No wonder Fergus Ewing, a voice of energy sanity, has decided to walk. Perhaps Ed Miliband may be following him in the not-too-distant future.
