Alan's Ramblings - glossop tag

Nuclear Glossop

Wed, 01 Feb 2006 06:14:31 GMT

I was futzing around on the web looking for something else entirely when I found this site which catalogues all of the 1563 Royal Observer Corps bunkers that are scattered over the UK. The history of the ROC is fascinating - they were originally set up in 1925 to visually report and track any enemy aircraft flying over the UK. At the height of the Cold War in 1957 they became part of the United Kingdom Warning and Monitoring Organisation (UKWMO), the intention being that in case of a nuclear attack they would report the location and extent of the bombs that were dropped on the UK. To this end a chain of small three-man bunkers were built across the UK, so naturally I had a look to see where the closest one was to me, and to my astonishment it was less than 400m from my house! Most of the posts stuck to to a standard design - in the photo above you can see the top of the entry shaft in front of the telegraph pole, to the front and right of the entry shaft is the blanked-off pipe that held a radiation counter. There's also a smaller pipe lower down in the grass which was the input port for the blast overpressure gauge. To the right of that (with the baffles) is the top of the air ventilator. This particular bunker was decommissioned in 1991, shortly before the ROC was itself disbanded.

The bunkers were small and cramped - there was no mains electricity, no water supply and the toilet facilities consisted of a bucket, and quite often they were damp as well. I'm not sure just how effective they would have been had anyone actually dropped anything that went 'bang' in a serious fashion - the telegraph pole in the picture above was in fact the only communications mechanism when the bunker was originally commissioned, and lengths of dead pine tree with wire strung between them doesn't seem to be a particularly blast-proof communications system to my untrained eye! Perhaps the most unenviable job in the post was that of the 3rd observer who, shortly after the attack, had to climb out of the bunker and retrieve the photographic paper from the Ground Zero Indicator (GZI), which was basically a pinhole camera - the fireball of the detonation would burn marks on the graduated paper inside the GZI, and from that the position and altitude of the detonation could be determined. If that wasn't bad enough, he was also responsible for hauling the chemical toilet up the 15 foot entrance shaft and disposing of the contents!

Three hot days and a thunderstorm

Thu, 12 Aug 2004 01:45:37 GMT

There's an old joke that says that summer in Britain consists of 'three hot days and a thunderstorm', which is exactly what has been happening with the weather over the last week, as a results of us being slapped around by the tail end of Hurricane Alex - on Tuesday we had over 100mm of rain in a day (that's over 4 inches for my colonial friends ;-). In fact only a couple of weeks ago I was out walking and the conditions were more like late October than midsummer - this shot was taken from the top of Lawrence Edge, looking west down the Longdendale reservoir chain.

One of the consequences of the long-standing pollution of the Dark Peak moorland is that it kills the plant cover on the moors, which exposes the bare peat underneath. When there is heavy rain the peat gets rapidly eroded and washed away, as you can see by the colour of the water going down Wildboar Clough:

The Moors for the Future project is trying to repair over 100 years of damage and revegetate the bare peat surfaces. This is partly funded by the Water Authority who have a vested interest, both because the peat silts up the reservoirs, and because it costs money to remove the discolouration from the water.

Now that the fence around Bleaklow has been completed and this year's helicopter reseeding and liming has taken place, it's astonishing how rapidly the vegetation has recovered, especially after last year's disastrous fires. I think the major factor has been the fence, as existing grass which was cropped flat is now 30-40 cms long and covered in seed heads. I've always suspected that the real cause of the problems was largely due to overgrazing by sheep, and the way the vegetation has bounced back proves it. So much for the farming fraternity being 'The guardians of the countryside', as they are always fond of telling us! For a long time they've pointed the finger at walkers as being the cause of the erosion, but it's quite difficult to see how that could be the case - people prefer to walk along well-defined paths, and the moors suffer mostly from widespread surface denudation rather than footpath erosion, which has been reduced anyway since most of the more eroded path has been resurfaced with stone flags.

One benefit of the damp spell we've been having is it keeps everything moist, allowing things like these rather splendid fungi to grow, the big one at the back was 20cm (8") across.

However, it hasn't been raining all the time, last weekend I took the kids out for a wander around Tintwistle Low, the picture below is looking southwards across the valley, over Valehouse reservoir and towards Glossop, which is just out of view over the hill in the foreground. - my house is about 4k (2.5 miles) away from here. The ridge on the far left skyline is the southern edge of Kinder.

Wild Britain in Bloom

Sun, 06 Jun 2004 07:32:43 GMT

In a vain attempt to prevent my already degenerate carcass from degenerating still further, I've once again taken to trotting around Mossy Lea, a pretty little valley just round the corner from the house. It's not that far - about 4k, but with a reasonable amount of climbing - 360ft or so. I'd noticed the unusual amount of wild-flowers that seemed to be around this year, so I took my camera on one of my circumnavigations last week - the fact that it also gave me a convenient excuse to keep stopping to take photos had nothing to do with it ;-)


Looking down from Shire Hill over Old Glossop. My house is in amongst those on the left of the picture. This 130ft, 20% climb is right the start . My legs are aching just thinking about it. At dusk this is a good place to see the Pipistrelle bats that I've mentioned earlier.	Rhododendron ponticum in full bloom. Although this looks pretty when it is in flower, it is an introduced species and has a pernicious impact on native fauna and flora - in fact active efforts are being made to eradicate it from Shire Hill.	This on the other hand is a native species, Hyacinthoides non scripta or the Native Bluebell, dappled shade under deciduous trees being a favoured habitat.

The Native Bluebell is also under threat from the introduced Spanish Bluebell Hyacinthoides hispanica with which it freely hybridises. These however are the real McCoy.	The high point of the round, 790ft ASL. The valley in the distance is Yellowslacks, with Mossy Lea Farm in the valley below. The hillside above the wall on the right is Shelf Benches, an abandoned quarry that has been entirely reclaimed by nature.	The valley contains quite a number of Hawthorn trees, Crataegus monogyna. I've never seen them carrying this much blossom before - the smell as you pass them is quite overpowering, especially on a warm day.

Looking down Mossy Lea towards Glossop, with Shire Hill on the left. Edge Plantation, the hillside on the right hand side of the valley with the track curving up it has just been planted with native broadleaved trees - something to benefit future generations.	This Hawthorn tree is one of my kid's favourites due to the odd lean that it has. Hawthorn is very common in the UK - nearly all of the hedges that are such a key feature of the countryside are Hawthorn.	Another common native plant, Cytisus scoparius or Broom, so named because that's what its twigs and branches used to be used for. (Elaine, if your broomstick is looking a little bare I can send you some ;-)

You just can't make this stuff up

Fri, 30 Jan 2004 11:25:06 GMT

The cult TV series The Leauge of Gentlemen (more info here, here and here) was filmed in the (very) small town of Hadfield which ajoins the slightly larger but still small town of Glossop, where I live. Despite the valiant attempts of the writers of the show to visit the outer bounds of freakishness, anyone who lives in the area knows the show is only a feeble imitation of the real-life wierdness of Glossopdale. As an illustration, and with no further comment I offer the following front-page article from this week's Glossop Advertiser.

'DEPRESSED' COUNCILLOR IN ARREST SHAME
Was wearing women's clothes

A COUNCILLOR who was wearing women's clothing when arrested by police for being drunk in charge of a vehicle says the incident was sparked by the death of his mother.

Simmondley councillor Peter Urquhart, 59, appeared before Manchester magistrates on Friday charged with being drunk in charge of a vehicle. He was three times over the legal limit.

The father of three was wearing a blonde wig, a low cut top and short skirt at the time.

Arrested last July he had been sitting in a car with a friend outside a pub in Blackley when officers received a tip-off.

Prosecutor Cath Cundy said that when police approached the car they found the engine was running and he was wearing his seat beat.

Councillor Urquhart, whose wife Anne Urquhart is deputy head at Hadfield Infants School, was fined £250 with £350 costs and given a 12-month ban.

Councillor Urquhart, of Marple Road, Charlesworth denied the charge and said he hadn't been intending to drive. During the trial he said he dressed as a woman because it helped him relax.

He told the Advertiser after the case: "Since my mother died I've been through a spiral of decline. And drink was the way I coped with it at the time.

"I was arrested the day after she died. She had suffered with severe heart problems and had been slowly dying before our eyes."

He added: "I'd even been in hospital myself with the stress and in the middle of all that the election was taking place I had the two things to deal with at once."

The retired teacher, who also received a conviction for drink driving in September said he had never been in trouble before this period.

He has been seeing a counsellor and taking medication for depression.

He said he hoped to continue his role as councillor and that his constituents in Simmondley would be sympathetic.

"I will be doing my best to get back on track and I hope people will be supportive if they know some of the background to it" he said.

Hauling heather

Mon, 08 Dec 2003 11:06:31 GMT

As part of the Moors for the Future project, large amounts of cut heather is going to be spread on the burnt, eroded and degraded areas of peat on Bleaklow. The heather contains lots of seed which will hopefully germinate and recolonise the bare peat areas, and the cut heather will also act as a mulch to protect the peat and the new growth from the erosive effects of the weather. The peat is far to delicate and soft to allow the use of machinery, so all the heather (several thousand bales) has to be cut, loaded onto lorries, brought to the nearest roadhead, transferred onto tractor trailers and moved to the marshalling point - Glossop Low - via a farm track, from where it will be airlifted by helicopter onto the moor. Yesterday (Sunday) I walked up from the house to the marshalling point to (foolishly!) give a hand with the loading operation.

There are several thousand bales of cut heather to be moved (the piles in the background are just a small portion), and in order for them to be lifted by the helicopter they all need to be loaded into lift bags (the white bags in the foreground).

All the heather bales have to be individually hand-loaded into the lift bags, 10-12 per bag. This is a very awkward (and scratchy!) operation, and is extremely tiring - we managed to fill about 30 bags in 3 hours, by which time I was completely knackered - taking photos was a good excuse to have a breather :-)

Some of the heather is cut into smaller pieces to make it easier to spread, and this (fortunately!) comes already loaded into lift bags. Shifting these is a much easier operation, requiring only the services of a local farmer and a tractor.

At this time of year it gets dark by just after 3:30pm, so at 3:00pm we stopped work - for which I was extremely grateful. I cadged a lift down the hill on one of the Land-Rovers, and walked the short distance back home from Blackshaw farm, past Swineshaw reservoirs. My arms and hands are still aching :-)