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The North Carr was the last manned lightship in Scotland.
The purpose of the vessel was to warn mariners of the dangers of the North Carr rocks which are situated I.7 miles off Fife Ness at the turning point for vessels entering the Forth from the North and bound for the Tay.
Between 1800 and 1809 16 vessels were lost in this area. It was not possible to build a lighthouse on the rocks and the Northern Lighthouse Board first moored a buoy off the rocks in 1809. The buoy broke its moorings five times and it was then decided to put a lighted beacon on the rocks. This proved difficult to do, but it was finally completed in 1821.
In 1887 the board decided that a manned light vessel was needed. The first North Carr lightship was built in Dundee by Messrs Alexander Shape and Sons. It was wooden hulled and copper sheathed below the water line. This vessel was 103 feet long and weighed 225 tonnes. It’s light was an oil one, but was replaced by acetylene in 1910.
The present North Carr was built in Glasgow by AJ Inglis Ltd in 1932 at a cost of just over £15,000 and went on station in 1933. The ship was paid for by ships who used the route between Aberdeen and Dunbar.
The present North Carr was taken off station in 1975 and replaced by the present North Carr Buoy, which is now powered by solar panels. It was for a period a floating museum in Anstruther. It is now berthed in Victoria dock in Dundee and is in the care of the Marine Volunteer Service (Tay Unit) who use it as a headquarters for their activities and training. The vessel is dedicated to Admiral Thomas Cochrane.
The North Carr is made of steel and iron. Steel above the water as this is more resistant to damage and iron below which is heavier and also has a surface which seaweed and molluscs find it more difficult to stick on to. The North Carr is 101 ft in length, 25 ft in breadth and weighs 250 tons.
The North Carr does not have engines and had to be towed onto station. Once on station she was kept in position by an anchor that weighed three tons and which was attached to the vessel by anchor chains with links that were over an inch and a half thick. The length of the chain had to be adjusted at times and the North Carr contains a winch to do this enclosed inside the winch or “windlass” house. When she was operating the North Carr also carried two smaller spare anchors. Today one of the North Carr’s anchors is placed on the quayside beside the gangplank leading onto the vessel.
UPPER DECK
LIGHTHOUSE TOWER AND LIGHT
The focal point of the North Carr is the lighthouse tower. The North Carr’s unique signal was two flashes in quick succession every 30 seconds from a beam that was equivalent to half a million candles! The source of this beam was a 1.000 watt electric bulb magnified by lenses which rotated round the bulb. If the power failed the bulb could be replaced by a paraffin lamp. The light had to remain upright even in rough weather. A type of pendulum system and the fact that the table the light sat on was placed on a bed of mercury helped to keep the light fixed and still even in very bad weather conditions.
FOGHORN
The North Carr has a fog horn which was sounded when fog meant that the light was difficult to see. The fog horn has a range of about 10 miles and caused complaints from the public when it was first tested while stationed at a point outside Granton in the firth of Forth. The North Carr’s fog signal is two blasts every 90 seconds and the foghorn can be turned so that it is always pointing out to sea. When it needed to be turned in order not to deafen themselves the crew had to try and turn it between blasts!. These days the North Carr forms a focus for Hogmanay Celebrations in Dundee as the foghorn at much less then full strength! is sounded accompanied by a piper at the stroke of midnight.
LIFEBOATS
Behind the light tower on the port (left ) and starboard (right) side are two original wooden lifeboats, which the crew practiced launching and recovering every fortnight. Fortunately these boats were only ever used to carry out maintenance tasks such as painting the ship.
WATCHBOX
Just beyond the life boats Is the watchbox, also known by the crew as the chat house or the Upper deck box. This was manned 24, hours a day, the crew doing watches of 4 hours on and 8 hours off. The watch tower was added in 1956 when the North Carr underwent some refurbishment . Prior to this the crew had to take watch in the open or in really bad weather from the partial protection of the lower “shelter deck. The watch box provided a warmer place from which to watch and also had a sort of telephone that connected the box to the Master’s quarters inside North Carr.
ESCAPE HATCHES
To starboard in front of the watchbox is the opening to an escape hatch that leads to the water tight compartments below.
LOWER DECK
HEADS
At the stern (back) of the ship are situated the “heads” or toilets, one for the master and one for the crew. In the refurbishment in 1959, these were replaced by two indoor toilets.
RUDDER
The rudder has an arm and a wheel. The arm controls the rudder and the wheel could be locked into position by using ropes when towing the North Carr. Every three years or so the ship was towed away for routine maintenance which included scraping off up to six tons of seaweed and barnacles from the bottom and sides of the vessel.
MAGAZINE
On the deck is the hatch leading to the magazine where the safety flares were kept. A tap set into the deck near the magazine hatch says flood magazine. In a fire the crew, using a nearby fire pump could pump sea or “raw” water in to put out the fire. Every crew member was trained in fire fighting.
INSIDE NORTH CARR
THE GALLEY
The main door leading inside the vessel is situated on the starboard side. You enter into the galley which is equipped with a large range style oil fired cooker. The metal arms on the stove or “fiddles” prevented pots and pans falling off the stove in heavy seas.
The main meal was at midday and the men tended to eat that together. Each man had their own provisions but they tended to pool these for main meals. The crew (with the exception of the master and the assistant master) took turns to cook the main meal for a month at a time. No alcohol was allowed on board. A lighthouse tender or supply ship the Pharos visited the North Carr every fortnight with mail, stores, rations and relief crews.
The galley also now contains a plague commemorating the loss of the Mona lifeboat in her valiant attempt to rescue the North Carr crew in December 1959.
WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY ROOM (RADIO ROOM)
Looking toward the bow of the vessel on the right hand side is the Wireless Telegraphy Room which originally contained a radio transmitter, radio beacon and a ship to shore telephone. It is now used as an office for MVS activities.
The lightship was at times contacted by various radio clubs including the Sea Radio Club from St Ann’s College in Lancashire which also had a Sea Rangers group who visited the North Carr on a number of occasions when it was in dock at Granton for maintenance.
THE MASTERS QUARTERS (OFFICERS ACCOMODATION)
These quarters are situated in the stern of the ship and are reached by descending a flight of steps. As you enter the cabin to your left is a bunk known as the Engineer's bunk. This would have been used for someone like the Chief Engineer to stay over night during an annual inspection or it was sometimes used for a sick or injured crewman. It would have been easier to treat him in this bunk and in the case of an infectious illness, would have helped to prevent the infection spreading among the rest of the crew.
The room was heated by a small stove the chimney of which came out in the watch box, helping to make it warm. The Master and the Assistant Masters” main duty was to attend to the day to day running of the ship. Therefore they spent much of their time in these quarters doing paperwork such as writing up the daily log book, reports and requisitions for stores. The Master and Assistant Master only kept watch in emergencies but were on call at all times.
The quarters have bench seats which have storage underneath. These seats could also be used to climb up onto the escape ladder that leads to the escape hatches on the upper deck. It is a tight squeeze but apart from regular emergency evacuation drills, this ladder would only have needed to be used if the compartment was flooding and the crew needed to get out quickly and safely.
PANTRY
There are two cabins in the Masters Quarters and a small pantry sits in between them. It was basically a food store and has a porthole that looks directly into the magazine so that anyone going in there would be visible.
MASTERS CABIN
It is small and contains a bunk and a fitted wooden locker. All the bunks on board are short by design, so that in rough weather your bent knees would have pinned you in and helped you not to roll out of the bunk. At the moment there is a wooden disk at the foot of the bunk, where a clock would have once hung. This was the first thing the Master would have looked at if he had been asleep when called on to deal with something. It would have been important to be able to record the exact time when he later wrote an account of the matter in the log or in a report.
CREWS QUARTERS
A flight of steps beside the radio room takes you down to where the crew slept and relaxed when off duty. Each man had a bunk and a locker. The MVS now uses this room as a classroom. It contains some of the old radio equipment as well as posters of Soviet Naval Surveillance equipment and vessels. During the cold war the North Carr had to inform the Admiralty of any sightings of such equipment and of any Russian vessels.
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