GIANT WAVE - The Lighthouse - page 76

from the weather and sea with the potential for it to be washed away. However, lifting
a large, heavy box of ropes backwards and forwards from a place of relative safety, say
up by the station itself (i.e. the lighthouse building) would be a relatively pointless and
tiresometaskrequiringtwomenandwouldalsoprobablyhighlightalackofconfidence
in the ability of the men to properly secure the box of ropes and any other equipment
down on the west landing.
One odd item is that in Muirhead's report there is no mention of the storm damage
seen by Muirhead in the station log itself. If the damage was mentioned in the log then
Muirhead, for whatever reason, does not mention it. One would have expected him to
do so if only to pinpoint the date the giant wave had hit the west landing. It is incon-
ceivable that the men on the station would not have entered the damage in the log be-
cause not to have done so would have implied a lack of diligence on their part at the
very least. Even if there was damage or loss of property, the railings which had been
torn out of the concrete would have been impossible to repair on their own and would
haverequiredhelpfromheadquarterstoarrangetosendoutmenandmaterialstorepair
the damage. Possibly one main conclusion that can be drawn from this is that the dam-
age caused by the giant wave happened after the men disappeared. The wind and the
sea between 20 and 21 December 1900 was extreme enough for many reports to talk
of storms and hurricanes in the newspapers. The very high winds which were blowing
from the south-west across the Flannans increased in strength as they travelled further
north and shifted to the north-west and four fishing trawlers were sunk in the Shetlands
with the loss of twenty-two lives on 21 December in what came to be as known as the
Delting Disaster.
QuiteapartfromDucat'sandMarshall'syearsofexperience aslightkeepers, theidea
that because the three lightkeepers were fairly new to the Flannan Islands and were not
aware of the potential for giant waves to hit the west landing can be laid to rest with
what happened shortly after the lighthouse became operational in December 1899. Ori-
ginally, at the opening of the light station on Eilean Mor, there was not one but two
cranes at the west landing. One crane was placed on the platform 70ft above sea level,
and a second crane was a further 50ft above this one. This second crane was therefore
110ft above sea level at the top of the cliff edge. Before the end of December 1899, a
giant wavehadhitthewestlanding withenoughpowertowashawaynotjustthelower
crane, but also the higher crane at 110ft. 4 This had meant that the wave which hit the
cranes must have had tremendous power and size which was enough to clear the cliff
at the very top and drag anything down with it. The crane on the 70ft platform was
replaced, but not the higher one. In addition to the cranes, two 25cwt Greenheart logs
(of South American origin and used for their anti-rotting properties in marine envir-
onments), which had been stored in a crevice at 75ft, had also been completely swept