Arnish Lighthouse

<![CDATA[ It was announced on Friday afternoon that the Harris Tweed mill at Shawbost, on the West Side of Lewis, is to close. The KM (Kenneth Macleod) Group, which owns the mill in North Shawbost, has announced that efforts will be made to employ the 30 workers elsewhere within the organisation. KM Group has another mill in Stornoway. The company was involved with an order from sportswear giant Nike to produce Harris Tweed based women's trainers in 2004.

This follows hard on the heels of a decision to scale back operations at another Harris Tweed mill in Lewis, this one based at Gearrannan, just outside Carloway, 6 miles west of Shawbost. The Carloway mill is reported to be operating 3 days a week now. It is not part of the KM Group, and has been at the centre of a bitter legal battle with KM over the application of the Orb, the Harris Tweed trademark, to its products.

The councillor for Shawbost has described the decision to close the Shawbost mill as a terrible blow, and has urged KM to do its utmost to salvage the situation.

Harris Tweed is a trademark, which cannot be used unless the tweed meets certain criteria. These include requirements on the methods of production, amongst others. It is not restricted to the isle of Harris; the entire island chain from Lewis to Barra falls within its remit.

Postscript - Sunday 2 July
I happened to watch the Countryfile programme on BBC1 this morning, and was very surprised to hear presenter Ben Fogle confidently declaring that the future is bright, the future is Tweed. If this is the case, then why is the Shawbost mill being shut down? If there verily was an order for 6 miles of Harris Tweed from Nike, why is the capacity being shrunk? It should also be borne in mind, that the job losses are not restricted to the 30 at the Shawbost plant. The production of Harris Tweed also involves weavers, and under the Harris Tweed "Orb" trademark, these are home weavers, who have previously invested heavily in new looms etcetera, only to see their investment going to waste.

Two questions need answering on the Harris Tweed industry question.
1 - Why have industry leaders in the Hebrides allowed the industry to shrink to the vanishing point? Even if the American market, encompassing a 60% marketshare, fell away, this still leaves a 40% market segment. By all accounts, there is far less than this percentage left in terms of production capacity.

2 - Why did Ben Fogle (or more to the point: BBC Countryfile) not address this issue with a touch of investigative journalism, rather than paint the image that the industry wants the world to see - which does not appear to be an accurate reflection of the situation on the ground.

Pertinent questions have been asked about awkward issues in these islands before (NHS Western Isles and the windfarms), and the reactions to those questions have left me in despair. Rather than providing an answer, those in the know prefer to shoot the messenger. I do not expect much better on this issue. ]]>

<![CDATA[ Awoke this morning to the sight of a 200 ft section of white piping being loaded onto a barge at the Arnish Fabrication Yard.

The shed is 80 ft high, so it gives a sense of proportion. I do not have definite information on the destination of this pipe, but I am aware of Arnish Yard currently working on projects for an off-shore windfarm east of Caithness and for a windfarm in the Netherlands. It is good to see the yard back in full flow, after months and years of stagnation.

News also come through this morning, that the electricity company, Scottish and Southern Energy, have told the Stornoway Trust that they will NOT pay for the infrastructure, needed for the six-windturbine development along the Pentland Road, west of Stornoway. This infrastructure includes the construction of roadways, six transformer stations and a wind measuring mast. The announcement has increased the cost of construction by 2 to 3 million pounds, giving the Stornoway Trust, who has commissioned the project, a bit of a headache.

And I thought it required an interconnector for this whole scheme to work as well. An interconnector being the subsea electricity cable that carries the power across to the mainland. Last time I was on Beinn Mholach, a wind measuring mast was there, but lying on the ground. The nearby hill of Beinn Thulabaigh does have a mast on it, which looks like wind monitoring. Well, proposed finishing date for the Beinn Mholach project is 2013, if memory serves - the North Lewis windfarm is projected to be constructed very close by, its range of turbines march south from Bragar, via Roiseal Mor past the eastern foot of the Barvas Hills (of which Beinn Mholach is one) towards Stornoway. Another windfarm for Stornoway is due to start construction in the Arnish area by the end of the summer.

The picture below shows what a 450 ft high windturbine could look like, if built on the quayside at the Arnish Yard. It is an "artist impression", worked on the assumption that the shed at Arnish is 80 ft high, which I used as bench mark for working the picture.

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<![CDATA[ Just thought I'd share some pics I took on a recent walk "round the Creed", which is a good 90 minute amble from the Bayhead Bridge.

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<![CDATA[ Just one picture - of a (virtually) cloudless, deep blue sky, as captured this evening at 6.23pm. Very rare.

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<![CDATA[ On Saturday, the Emergency Services held an Open Day at the Coastguard Station on Battery Point here in Stornoway. It was very well attended, lots of interest from children being brought along by their parents. One or two ambulances, a fire engine and an airport firetender were there, as was the Coastguard helicopter Hotel Lima. An air ambulance called in for a little while as well. A Royal Navy bomb disposal squad had a stand, and did a demonstration of their skills, which literally went off with a bang. The lifeboat performed a "rescue" of two men who had gone "overboard". The police were in attendance, as were representatives of the SSPCA. A member of a cliff rescue team gave a demonstration on a climbing wall, and the Coastguard Station itself was open for viewing, including the ops room upstairs. Twenty minutes before the bomb was let off in the water, a warning was broadcast to all shipping to avoid Stornoway Harbour. A coastguard vessel blocked the entrance to the harbour and the lifeboat stood by off Goat Island to stop anyone sailing into the danger zone from the town.

Also open for viewing was the coastguard tug Anglian Prince.
An RAF Nimrod performed a fly-past just before 4pm.

Very interesting afternoon with good weather, which I think was enjoyed by all.

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<![CDATA[ When I read the weather reports I find it very hard to believe it's actually summer. This morning saw some relatively benign conditions in Lewis - it's called being in the eye of the storm.

Further south though, all hell had broken loose with a force 9 gale and the lashing rain we had yesterday. Stornoway Coastguard has been very busy over the last 24 hours, with four yachts getting into difficulties near Barra. Fortunately, all were safe and either sheltering at Castlebay (Barra) or able to proceed with the race they were participating in. Fifty miles to the west, a group of people were ringing birds on the islet of Dun, south of Village Bay in St Kilda. Their tent had blown down in the gales and had spent the past two days without food or water. The lifeboat is unable to negotiate the seas around Dun in those conditions (which says enough), so the helicopter flew out to pick them up for a quick transfer to mainland St Kilda. Again, all were safe and well.
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