Duncan Harley

Todays news that officers from Fraserburgh Coastguard Rescue Team were called out to investigate reports of a sinking ship off Cairnbulg comes as no great surprise. Called into action by the HM Coastguard Operations Centre in Aberdeen following a report by a concerned walker the investigators quickly realised that the wreck was none other than the fishing vessel Sovereign, which had foundered off Cairnbulg in 2005. This is not the first time that the rusting wreck has made headlines. July 2014 saw the crew of the Fraserburgh lifeboat summoned to rescue the crew of the Sovereign only to discover that it had foundered some nine years before A member of the lifeboat crew told reporters that a tourist had been standing on Tiger Hill when she spotted the ship lying on its side on a reef. Scottish Television News reported that "She must have thought that it had just freshly sunk and made the call to the RNLI. It is a familiar landmark to locals but you can see how easy i...

Following its decline as a cargo and fishing port Portsoy has in recent years capitalised on its biggest asset – its connection with the sea.  This weekend the town hosted the 25 th annual Scottish Traditional Boat Festival and, in sweltering sunshine, visitors were treated to a maritime spectacular as 21 st century maritime heritage mingled with the likes of the 128-year-old Wick registered Isabella Fortuna. Arbroath built, the Isabella was launched in 1890 and is a regular festival visitor. In far off 1994 the inaugural event firmly placed Portsoy on the tourist map and visitor numbers regularly swell the resident population of 1,800 to a giddy 18,000 on festival weekend. 1994 also saw a world first: the landing of a radio-controlled model helicopter onto the deck of the world’s largest model aircraft carrier, Duncan Cameron’s 31ft radio controlled Invincible , within the shelter of the 17 th century harbour.  Nowadays an annual fixture and undoubted leader of ...