Hermaness

STORMY WEATHER

Experience the power of the elements at The Sky Trail Hermaness. This stop explores Unst’s history of stormy weather through local memories and dialect poetry.

Remembering the 1991 Hurricane at Sky Trail Hermaness

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Memories of the hurricane of 1991 from Unst man, Tony Mouat. Captured in 2021 as part of the Wild Skies Shetland project.

Makkin hame

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Makkin Hame is a poem about the crew of a fishing boat during a stormy night at sea. Written and performed by Shetland poet, James Sinclair. Reproduced here by kind permission of Shetland for Wirds

Visit Hermaness [W3W: stones.decrease.hazy]

The Hurricane of 1991

My name is Tony Mouat, I’m going to tell you a story about the hurricane of New Year’s Eve, ’91.

We’d been at Uyeasound to a Ruby Wedding, and it finished reasonably early, about half past ten. So, we were coming home and going past the beach at Uyeasound, there was no wind, and yet there was quite the big waves coming in and it just seemed so unusual and quite eerie.

We arrived in Baltasound about probably 11 o’clock. So, we went over to my mother and father’s house, which is about half a mile from us. We picked them up to take them home to bring in the new year and the wind was starting to get fresh then, but there had been no forecast for bad wind whatsoever, so we weren’t expecting anything so they came in and we brought in the new year. And the wind was getting up quite badly, and about 1 o’clock, it was almost gale force, so we thought ‘well, we must get mum and dad home’ while they’re able because they got a little burn to cross at their house. So, we set off at 1 o clock, got them home, coming back, by the time we got to our house, it was a severe gale.

And when I got out of the car, the first thing that came flying through the air was my garden shed. It crashed into the dog house. And up came the dog, yelping, but it wasn’t injured, it was ok, but we managed to get into the house, along with the dog, and then I noticed the hen house went, and then my caravan went.

Anyway we got into the house and there was a really, really bad gale by this time, and you couldn’t hear yourself speakin’, there were slates coming across from the houses a quarter of a mile away and they were stickin’ in the ground just in front of the big window and I thought ‘if a slate hits that big window, that’ll be my roof going up’.

But anyway then the lights went out and I heard a couple of crashes outside and I thought ‘what was that?’ so I got a big torch and I looked down on top of my car, which is parked on the north side of the house and the slates was coming off my house and hitting the top of my car, so I thought, ‘oh, I’ll have to move my car’. So, I stuck on a crash helmet, and crawled around to the east side of the house in the lee, and got into the car. And I flashed up on the roof and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, the slates wis going straight up in the air, they weren’t being blown off, they were being sucked up. The ridge tiles on the roof wis about a meter long and there’s a bolt on each end set into concrete. And it was sucking them up and I thought ‘well if that tile slides down the south side of the house, it’ll go through the bedroom window, where my two boys are sleeping’ so I thought ‘I must get back in the house and tell them to go down the stairs in one of the bedrooms’.

I got out of the car and I completely had no control of my body. I was thrown heels over heels, rolled down for about 50 or 60 yards, and eventually I came to rest in the little burn that’s not far from us. And I tried to get back. I couldn’t stand up, I crawled and I dug my fingers into the ground and kept completely flat and crawled gradually and gradually and gradually and two times I had to stop and put my hands around my mouth, so I could breathe. It was the suction – I’ve never seen anything like it or felt like that.

Eventually I got into the house, of course by this time Irene was quite worried. We hardly slept a wink that night, the wind was really very, very bad.

In the morning all the fences was covered in bits and pieces from sheds and caravans. I don’t think there was a shed or a caravan left in the island. It really was a very bad night and Saxa Vord, the raid dome recorded up to two hundred mile an hour and then it broke. So, it was over two hundred mile an hour, the gale was. Most people got an awful fright and there was a lot of damage done on the island. And I hope it will never ever see one like that again.

Makkin hame

Charlotte Anne took da rodd her ancestors drave
strampin ower da heicht o white cappit waves
lik a flat stane skitterin ower da ream-calm.
Her sail filt tae da brim wi a nor-wasterd,
fish room filt tae lipperin wi muckle codlin.

Bridders Jamsie, skipper, an Willie wirkin da sail.
Jamsie’s boys Geordie, an Mansie wha wis
named eftir his grand-fedder. Da idder crew
Johnnie Brucker, Sammy o Nort-Hoose an da
sheep tief’s youngest boy, Daniel.

Willie wis watchin wadder, windrin erts
an takin meids as da mirkenin fell aw roond. Jamsie
wis aw fur turnin her heid ida wind, waitin morning licht.
Willie said naa, da wind wid turn southerly
an dey wid miss dir chance wi da tide.

Darkenin cam an wi nae mön tae licht der wey
dey reefed in da sail, doon-haulin wi wan easy pull,
reducin canvas an haevin up da rackie on da tows.
Da speed fell aff Charlotte Anne as shu cam tae heel.
Willie ahint da stong, laid his hand on da halyard cleat.

Slippin aff his sea-buits an his ooie-socks
he set his twa cowld feet, een on da first swill
an wan on da second harsing.
Feelin da sea coorse trowe him, lik da blöd
in his veins, his hert pumpin fae da rush o da waves.

His lang taes, wirkin dir wey back an fore, ower
da splintery boards, lik fingers saftly wirkin
dir wey up da warm riggy-bane o a lass in a box bed.
Charlotte Anne plooed on, da mirr o da wind ida stroods.
Awthing tick, slokkit in pitch an treacle.

Willie’s een glinderin tae pick oot da moder-dye
taes feelin fur da hertbaet o a wirkin sixareen.
Her thin skeen streetched ower eddy an undertow.
A voice in his heid, da voice o his bridder
a lang lost ghost o da gale o eighty wan.

Caallin fae da deep ‘Nae guid’ll come o dis, mak fur da nordert’
an as dey med nort, he listened as Charlie’s wirds faded awey.
Wi da dark cam da cowld, aabody happit up in whit claes dey hed

tinkin lang fur da chair afore da stove an warm bannocks.
tryin herd no tae tink o da crabs gettin dir eyes.

Wi dat sam, Willie lookit ower an saw
a smudge o licht tae port, da Wasting,
an tae starboard da sam, da hooses o Broch.
Listenin careful fur da baa brak at da point
Willie yelled, ‘Mak full helm tae port’.

As shu swang roond, he felt trowe his feet
da tide grippin da keel draggin her, racin
intae da soond. Willie pulled aff a lump o twist
pokkit it in his pipe an strak a match.
‘Nearly dere boys, drap da sail an grip da oars –

we’ll be roond da ness in a minute ur twa.’

An wi dat sam dey rowed, pullin her oot o da tide.
Dey saw lichts ashore, smelt paet reek
an dey aw let oot a lang breath o relief, whin
da forefit scrapit up da shingly beach.