ON CRUISING
CUMBERLIDGE PETER CUMBERLIDGE: The demolition of Grain power station pulled England’s tallest coastal landmark down with it, marking the end of an era for a grand and monumental pilotage beacon
On September 7 this year, England’s tallest coastal landmark was spectacularly demolished by explosives in a vast cloud of rubble dust which drifted over the Thames Estuary like a fog bank. The 800ft power station chimney on the Isle of Grain was taken down in an almost surgical operation during the last stage of dismantling the power station, which closed in 2012.
About two and a half times the height of Big Ben, this iconic tower has been useful to mariners since 1979, and I have taken bearings of it many times. The ‘Isle’ is a low expanse of marshy land between Sea Reach and the River Medway, and the power station could be seen for miles around, especially from seaward. For ships arriving from the North Sea, the chimney was their first tangible sighting of London, appearing long before the flat Thames shores lifted above the horizon. This giant industrial structure made landfalls seem real, when the crouching coastline all around was so ethereal.
In the early years of the power station, before yachts used GPS, navigators crossing the intricate estuary channels between Kent and the Essex Rivers would use compass bearings of the chimney and North Foreland to check their progress through the maze of sandbanks.
Interestingly, this rather sad demise ashore highlights the dramatic shift to offshore power generation hereabouts. On passage from Ramsgate to Harwich recently, passing through Fisherman’s Gat, we skirted the eerie battalions of high-tech propellers in the Kentish Knock part of the London Array wind farm, said to be the largest offshore site in the world. The turbines cover over 70 square nautical miles on and between the Long Sand and Kentish Knock banks, a fantastic outer landfall for arriving vessels.
The vis was hazy as we approached Fisherman’s Gat, a buoyed, often quite busy shipping channel leading into Black Deep. Once through the Gat, we turned up towards Sunk Head, thereby circling the south and west sides of the London Array. The ghostly turbines looked sinister to me and I wondered what it would feel like to be drifting with engine trouble and sluiced by the tide towards this hazardous area. Rather nasty, I thought, a new kind of seafarer’s nightmare akin to being driven on to a rocky lee shore.
I was pleased when we’d left all these monsters astern and were heading towards Harwich. Coming in through the Medusa Channel, we passed the strange octagonal tower on the Naze promontory, about half the height of a wind turbine but more pleasant to look at. At least, like a power station chimney, you can take a useful bearing of it!
there’s a scene in the Bond movie Skyfall that really hits the sweet spot for me. 007 has just been presented with the gadgets needed to undertake his latest secret mission by Q. their exchange runs along the following lines: Bond: “a gun and a radio. It’s not exactly christmas, is it?” Q: “What were you expecting, an exploding pen? We don’t really go in for that sort of thing any more.”
shot at the national Gallery in london, it was a masterstroke, shepherding Q neatly back into the fold, although the gadgets (as Bond wryly noted) were still very thin on the ground. eon Productions were determined not to repeat the rather cheesy gadget-fest of the Brosnan era (that pen reference a sly nod to Goldeneye, where an exploding pen helped Brosnan defeat the baddies).
of course both Skyfall gadgets were used to great effect, the palm-print signature Walther PPK (surely a nod to a similar weapon in Licence To Kill) saving Bond’s life when used against him, and the ‘radio’ (a personal locator beacon) summoning up three agustawestland lynx Wildcat helicopters – complete with union Jacks emblazoned on the sides – to rescue our hero.
Personally I’ve always loved gadgets, be they in Bond films or real life. I remember the first car I had with remote central locking and doing that thing where you ‘fire’ the key fob from across the car park to see how far away you could ‘shoot’ your car from – a hit being rewarded by a satisfying amber flash of hazard lights. It might not quite have been the remote-control BMW 750i of Tomorrow Never Dies but it was a good start. Incidentally, there’s a tie-up between exclusive swiss watchmaker Jaegerlecoultre and aston Martin whereby you can have a transponder for your aston fitted into a rather elegant watch. touch the watch in the right place as you approach your car and it unlocks – that’s very Bond!
Mobile phones – they’ve lost their magic now but when they first came out (the size and weight of a brick and costing about a million pounds), they were the coolest gadget in the world! at the yacht brokerage company I worked for we were issued one per office, which the manager was allowed to take home. But I remember tracy, who worked at our Poole office, borrowing theirs one night to take to the pub and arranging for someone to phone her. “oh sorry, that’s my cell phone, do excuse me” – chi-ching! Maximum cool gadget points right there. Kids today with their samsungs just don’t know they’re born.
I was reminded of my love of gadgets this week when receiving a demonstration of the latest marine safety equipment by ocean safety for a magazine feature I’m writing. the EPIRB (emergency position-indicating radiobeacon) is nothing new of course, but they’ve got smaller and they’ve got cheaper. on display was a yellow rescueme PLB1 personal locator beacon version, barely bigger than a pack of cigarettes. For those that don’t know, these amazing devices (upon activation) transmit to a satellite network using GPS to send its position. Dedicated rescue centres around the world act upon the information and send whatever rescue service is appropriate. so if you’re in the mountains it’ll be mountain rescue teams, but on the sea it’s likely to be a lifeboat, and/or a search and rescue helicopter. rescuers are equipped with devices that lock on to a homing signal that the EPIRB also transmits. I was so impressed, I bought one.
absolutely only to be used in dire life-anddeath situations of course, I fervently hope that I never have to use it. But if I do, I really hope they send three lynx Wildcat helicopters with big union Jacks on the side.