Hooptedoodle #266 - Our Very Own Private Aircraft Carrier

"Queen Elizabeth" in Rosyth dockyard

Today the new British aircraft carrier, Queen Elizabeth, sets to sea for 6 months trials. She is starting off from the shipyard at Rosyth early this morning. Things will be a bit tight getting her out - there are literally inches to spare either side at the dock entrance, and the clearance under her keel is officially estimated at 20cm. I hope and trust that this estimate is better than forecasts for budget or completion date have been.

Things are not straightforward after she leaves the yard - it will be necessary to wait for low tide to enable her to scrape under the Forth Bridges. [A government spokesman stated that if it turns out that she does not, in fact, fit under the bridges then we can at least be confident that Britain will have unchallenged strategic control of the stretch of the River Forth between Grangemouth and Queensferry.]

Thereafter the carrier, with escorts, will sail along the Firth of Forth, past our house, and out to the North Sea. I am all set to get the tripod up for a historic photo, but there is word that it may be late this evening (i.e. dark) when she passes here. I meant to check when low tide will be - I should know this, in fact, because we have a tide clock in our porch, but unfortunately the battery is flat. You wait decades for a new aircraft carrier - biggest, most expensive warship ever built in the UK, three times as big as Ark Royal - and then you're let down by a flat battery. Never mind, I'm sure someone online will know.

The main deck has room for three full-size football pitches - maybe it could be
used to host the 2022 World Cup?

When she sails past here (and we are right at the end of the Firth - the North Sea officially begins at a monument on our beach, or so we claim) we'll see her against the backdrop of the Fife coast and the Isle of May, a long, flat island in the Firth of Forth, legendary as the scene of the tragic, so-called Battle of May Island in 1918, which is such a bizarre story that, if you do not know it, you would not believe me, so I'll simply put a link to the Wikipedia entry, here.

The Isle of May - a lot closer than I've ever seen it

This business about having difficulty spotting things around here is a bit of a recurrent theme - maybe there's something odd about the area. Our beach is famous for spectacular views of the aurora borealis, but, despite a good many attempts, we've never had even a glimpse. On occasions we have arrived at the beach with binoculars and cameras, taken one look at the torrential rain and 100% cloud cover, given up and gone home, and then, the following morning, been able to see all the wondrous photos on Facebook that hardier (or luckier) punters have managed to capture.

The unseen aurora, from our beach

Another celebrated apparent local illusion was when my neighbour of the time, who was a fisherman, went one morning to reset his lobster pots off Canty Bay, about 2 miles away. His special trick of the trade was to keep his creels in shallower water than most of his competitors, which he reckoned got him a better yield, but he had to put a lot more effort into repairing and shifting them, since bad weather caused more damage in shallower water. This particular morning (which I see from The Scotsman archives was in 2003) he returned home to be greeted by his wife, who said that they'd been watching to see if he appeared on TV. Reidy was mystified - what TV? what was she talking about?

Canty Bay, without fog or whale (or Reidy)

Well, the night before a whale had washed up on the rocks at Canty Bay, and there were crowds of onlookers and a BBC crew to film the excitement as they attempted to float it off. Reidy never saw a thing - it was a bit foggy, but he was completely unaware of all the carry-on - he reset his creels and got about his business. Never saw anything unusual.

For years he had to live with his wife's mockery - no wonder he didn't earn much as a fisherman if he couldn't see a whale within a hundred yards. This is, after all, a coastline of mists and shadows, and unexplained lights - the setting for RL Stevenson's tales of wreckers - but maybe it's easier to see things we expect to see?

****** Late Edit 12:45pm ******

I found the Queen Elizabeth's Facebook page - it seems she is expected to leave the dockyard round about 5pm, and should sail under the bridges shortly before midnight. Let's see - she is not going to be going flat out, I imagine, and it's about 25 miles from Queensferry to here, so I reckon she should be here sometime around 1am, which doesn't sound promising for a photo. Never mind, I can get an early night...

Here's a rather more recent photo of the vessel in Rosyth, with a few more bits added from my first picture.

I note that the Daily Telegraph makes due mention of the fact that the dirty Russians will be waiting to have a good look at our new strategic weapon when it gets out into the sea. Boo. We should jolly well go and pull their furry hats down over their eyes. 

Press photo of the QE just about managing to pass under the Forth Rail Bridge