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Come with me if you want adventure. | 0:00:11 | 0:00:13 | |
Back we go to the sea | 0:00:13 | 0:00:16 | |
for a fresh look at the coast. | 0:00:17 | 0:00:20 | |
Grab your sou'westers and sign on for a brand new tour, right around the British Isles. | 0:00:20 | 0:00:27 | |
Stopping off at some spectacular sites close to home, | 0:00:27 | 0:00:31 | |
we'll also be venturing far out across the water to Denmark, | 0:00:31 | 0:00:36 | |
for a voyage with the Vikings. | 0:00:36 | 0:00:39 | |
And making a journey to the end of the Earth in Brittany, | 0:00:39 | 0:00:42 | |
to discover how shared seas unite us with our neighbours. | 0:00:42 | 0:00:47 | |
Our voyage around Britain and beyond doesn't start with the edge of our islands, but at their heart. | 0:00:47 | 0:00:52 | |
On this first leg of our journey, the Isle of Man is the hub, | 0:00:52 | 0:00:57 | |
as we spin round the United Kingdoms of the Irish Sea. | 0:00:57 | 0:01:01 | |
In England, Alice gets to grips with quicksand. | 0:01:01 | 0:01:04 | |
It's got me good and proper. | 0:01:04 | 0:01:06 | |
It really is quite scary. | 0:01:08 | 0:01:11 | |
On the Mersey, Mark unearths the ship that broke Brunel's heart. | 0:01:11 | 0:01:15 | |
There it is, as fresh as it comes. | 0:01:15 | 0:01:17 | |
In Wales, Nick wants to see how Anglesey was built. | 0:01:17 | 0:01:21 | |
I've been following this band of quartz all the way up and it's very beautiful. | 0:01:21 | 0:01:26 | |
Off the shore of Scotland, we wade out with fishermen who wrestle the raging tide. | 0:01:28 | 0:01:34 | |
Me, I explore the Isle of Man | 0:01:34 | 0:01:37 | |
and discover the birthplace of a right royal institution. | 0:01:37 | 0:01:41 | |
This is Coast and beyond. | 0:01:41 | 0:01:45 | |
The Isle of Man isn't part of the United Kingdom, | 0:02:10 | 0:02:13 | |
but it's got a special place in its heart looking out to all our shores. | 0:02:13 | 0:02:18 | |
Like the hub of a wheel, it's almost equidistant from Northern Ireland, | 0:02:19 | 0:02:23 | |
Scotland, England and Wales | 0:02:23 | 0:02:25 | |
and we'll visit them all on this first journey. | 0:02:25 | 0:02:29 | |
It might be tiny, but the Manx mainland packs in lots of landscapes. | 0:02:33 | 0:02:39 | |
Rolling green hills in the north, | 0:02:39 | 0:02:43 | |
a gnarled, rocky coastline in the south, | 0:02:43 | 0:02:46 | |
and a scattering of sandy beaches. | 0:02:46 | 0:02:51 | |
The Isle of Man could be the British Isles in miniature. | 0:02:51 | 0:02:54 | |
For a small island, it can boast some big ideas. | 0:02:57 | 0:03:02 | |
How about the Laxey wheel? | 0:03:02 | 0:03:04 | |
Now that's what you call a water feature. | 0:03:07 | 0:03:09 | |
And I've turned up in time to turn it on. | 0:03:12 | 0:03:15 | |
Keeper of the wheel Roger Clare is showing me how it's done. | 0:03:15 | 0:03:18 | |
Now all you need to do is turn the wheel clockwise. | 0:03:22 | 0:03:27 | |
-Does it start first time? -We'll see. | 0:03:27 | 0:03:31 | |
MECHANISM CREAKS | 0:03:31 | 0:03:33 | |
That's a good noise. | 0:03:33 | 0:03:34 | |
Opening this valve releases a flow of water which is forced | 0:03:34 | 0:03:38 | |
up the tower to cascade on the wheel, setting it in motion. | 0:03:38 | 0:03:42 | |
There it goes. | 0:03:42 | 0:03:43 | |
Oh, that's great. | 0:03:43 | 0:03:47 | |
You might get wet now. | 0:03:47 | 0:03:49 | |
Oh, yeah! | 0:03:49 | 0:03:50 | |
When it started to whirl in 1854, it wowed the locals | 0:03:52 | 0:03:57 | |
and its sheer scale is still staggering. | 0:03:57 | 0:04:01 | |
So why is the world's largest working waterwheel here, | 0:04:06 | 0:04:10 | |
spinning around at the centre of the Irish Sea? | 0:04:10 | 0:04:13 | |
There are clues to its construction nearby, | 0:04:13 | 0:04:16 | |
the abandoned lead mines and the port at the bottom of the valley. | 0:04:16 | 0:04:23 | |
It might be hard to believe today, but 120 years ago this place hummed with activity | 0:04:23 | 0:04:28 | |
as countless tonnes of zinc and lead ore were shipped out of the harbour here. | 0:04:28 | 0:04:32 | |
Sea trade kept business buoyant at Laxey, but underground water was threatening to sink it. | 0:04:34 | 0:04:41 | |
Mine expert Pete Geddis is going to show me the damp, dingy hell-hole below. | 0:04:46 | 0:04:52 | |
OK, Neil, well this is the sea entrance, access tunnel to the well shaft. | 0:04:52 | 0:04:56 | |
-This little door? -This little door. | 0:04:56 | 0:04:58 | |
Oh, yes, I hate it already. | 0:05:00 | 0:05:03 | |
It probably would have been wetter than this in the mining days | 0:05:03 | 0:05:07 | |
because the discharged water would have run along here. | 0:05:07 | 0:05:10 | |
Teams of miners toiled around the clock, chasing richer seams of ore. | 0:05:10 | 0:05:15 | |
As they dug deeper the water problem got worse. | 0:05:15 | 0:05:19 | |
-The miner's nightmare was the water ingressing into the shaft and then getting into the levels below. -Yeah. | 0:05:19 | 0:05:25 | |
Where is the water coming from, if that's not a stupid question? | 0:05:25 | 0:05:28 | |
This is just ground drainage water, it's running off the land, it's running down the bedrock, | 0:05:28 | 0:05:33 | |
and then it finds its way onto the edge of the shaft, so it's a perpetual sea of rain down here. | 0:05:33 | 0:05:39 | |
All mines flood. | 0:05:39 | 0:05:41 | |
Often water was pumped out with steam engines, | 0:05:41 | 0:05:44 | |
but with no coal on the Isle of Man, steam wasn't an option. | 0:05:44 | 0:05:48 | |
So what about putting the water to work? | 0:05:48 | 0:05:52 | |
That's what the Laxey wheel does, Victorian style. | 0:05:54 | 0:06:00 | |
Streams piped down the valley drove the wheel. | 0:06:00 | 0:06:03 | |
Its rotation-powered machine is capable of pumping out 250 gallons of water per minute. | 0:06:03 | 0:06:09 | |
Bailing out the mine shafts wasn't the wheel's only job. | 0:06:13 | 0:06:17 | |
They could have boxed the machinery in, hidden it away. | 0:06:17 | 0:06:22 | |
Instead it's deliberately sited at the head of the valley, | 0:06:22 | 0:06:26 | |
and emblazoned with the Three Legs of Man. | 0:06:26 | 0:06:30 | |
A wheel of fortune inviting investors to buy shares in the mine. | 0:06:32 | 0:06:38 | |
Now it's an emblem of Manx pride, a reminder that the island can match its powerful neighbours, | 0:06:39 | 0:06:45 | |
countries my fellow Coasters will explore on their wheel around the Irish Sea. | 0:06:45 | 0:06:51 | |
Our tour of the UK starts in North Wales, with Nick. | 0:06:53 | 0:06:59 | |
At the Dee Estuary, an imaginary line in the mud | 0:07:00 | 0:07:04 | |
marks the boundary between the English and the Welsh. | 0:07:04 | 0:07:08 | |
You soon hit a high spot of Victorian resort building, Llandudno. | 0:07:11 | 0:07:16 | |
The town's nestled in the shelter of the Great Orme's imposing cliffs, which point our way westward. | 0:07:18 | 0:07:24 | |
Out towards my destination, the largest island in Wales, Anglesey. | 0:07:27 | 0:07:32 | |
Many make their way to these cliffs for the glorious sights looking out | 0:07:35 | 0:07:40 | |
to sea, but what's brought me here are the rocks beneath my feet. | 0:07:40 | 0:07:46 | |
On the island's edge you see a slice right through the Earth's geological history, | 0:07:46 | 0:07:51 | |
an extraordinary collection of rocks are exposed here. | 0:07:51 | 0:07:56 | |
Just to show you how different Anglesey is, | 0:07:56 | 0:07:59 | |
look at this geological map of southern Britain. | 0:07:59 | 0:08:02 | |
Great swathes of it are all the same colour, meaning they're all the same rock type. | 0:08:02 | 0:08:06 | |
Here's this great band of chalk running up her in green, | 0:08:06 | 0:08:09 | |
there's another huge band of limestone running down here. | 0:08:09 | 0:08:11 | |
But up here on Anglesey something different is happening, | 0:08:11 | 0:08:16 | |
there's an intense mosaic of different colours, meaning there are many different rock types. | 0:08:16 | 0:08:23 | |
Much of the mystery of Anglesey's formation is buried below the turf, | 0:08:23 | 0:08:28 | |
but the coast reveals the island's subterranean secrets. | 0:08:28 | 0:08:32 | |
The most stunning geological feature is the long channel of water | 0:08:32 | 0:08:37 | |
that separates Anglesey from the mainland, the Menai Strait. | 0:08:37 | 0:08:41 | |
To understand its significance I'm with David Schofield from the British Geological Survey. | 0:08:43 | 0:08:49 | |
What part does this gulf play in Anglesey geology? | 0:08:51 | 0:08:54 | |
Well, this is actually a long fault zone which we call the Menai Strait fault system. | 0:08:54 | 0:08:59 | |
It separates very much | 0:08:59 | 0:09:01 | |
older rocks to the north west than those to the south east. | 0:09:01 | 0:09:05 | |
We're looking at a fundamental geological divide, which we know is still active | 0:09:05 | 0:09:08 | |
because we're seeing some of Britain's biggest earthquakes just happening along this fault line. | 0:09:08 | 0:09:12 | |
-Right where we're standing? -Right where we're standing, yes. | 0:09:12 | 0:09:15 | |
So the shore we're on here is moving in relation to the shore over there. | 0:09:15 | 0:09:19 | |
It certainly is, at a very slow rate every year, | 0:09:19 | 0:09:21 | |
and every now and then it takes a bit of a jump and there's an earthquake. | 0:09:21 | 0:09:25 | |
Around 300 small earthquakes shake Britain each year, often felt most | 0:09:26 | 0:09:32 | |
strongly here, caused as the mainland grinds against Anglesey. | 0:09:32 | 0:09:37 | |
It's part of the bigger movement of landmasses around the globe. | 0:09:37 | 0:09:42 | |
The Earth's crust is made up of separate distinct plates | 0:09:42 | 0:09:46 | |
which are constantly moving against each other. | 0:09:46 | 0:09:49 | |
Where the edges of the plate move apart new crust is created, about as fast as your fingernails grow. | 0:09:53 | 0:10:00 | |
Deep on the ocean floor, as the plates tear apart, lava can ooze out. | 0:10:00 | 0:10:07 | |
This fiery business of planet building is exposed beautifully | 0:10:07 | 0:10:12 | |
on a small strip of Anglesey at Llanddwyn Island. | 0:10:12 | 0:10:16 | |
Local geologist Margaret Wood is my guide. | 0:10:16 | 0:10:21 | |
These are the world-famous pillow larvas of Llanddwyn. | 0:10:21 | 0:10:25 | |
All I can see is a grey rock. | 0:10:25 | 0:10:27 | |
-What are we looking at? -Oh, it's beautifully bluey grey though, | 0:10:27 | 0:10:30 | |
we're looking at pillows which are lava which came up on the ocean bed. | 0:10:30 | 0:10:32 | |
They get into the water and immediately the outside will crack. | 0:10:32 | 0:10:36 | |
These huge great big rounded lumps here? | 0:10:36 | 0:10:38 | |
Each one of those is called a pillow. | 0:10:38 | 0:10:40 | |
It is astonishing the way that raw nature can produce these symmetries and shapes. | 0:10:40 | 0:10:45 | |
But having looked at those, | 0:10:45 | 0:10:48 | |
something even more extraordinary, on the other end of the island, | 0:10:48 | 0:10:51 | |
you've got material that has actually gone down back into the crust, | 0:10:51 | 0:10:55 | |
and the fantastic thing is Llanddwyn Island is a complete mini-plate. | 0:10:55 | 0:11:01 | |
But that's amazing, I always thought that these plates on the surface of | 0:11:01 | 0:11:05 | |
the Earth, really were the size of continents or oceans. | 0:11:05 | 0:11:08 | |
You're telling me that here on this beach in Anglesey there's an entire plate. | 0:11:08 | 0:11:13 | |
Absolutely. | 0:11:13 | 0:11:14 | |
This tiny island tells a big tale of how the Earth's built. | 0:11:14 | 0:11:20 | |
The plates of crust pull apart at one edge, but collide at the other edge. | 0:11:20 | 0:11:25 | |
As they crush into each other a jumble of different rocks is left behind, | 0:11:25 | 0:11:30 | |
which remarkably, you can also see on Llanddwyn Island. | 0:11:30 | 0:11:34 | |
Wow, just look at that! Those colours, Margaret! | 0:11:37 | 0:11:42 | |
-It's fantastic, isn't it? -So many shapes too, it looks like a great big blancmange. | 0:11:42 | 0:11:45 | |
It's wonderful, isn't it? Those are quartz-rich rocks, you've got limestone over there, | 0:11:45 | 0:11:51 | |
and you've got schists, you've got conglomerate, and the colours are fantastic, aren't they? | 0:11:51 | 0:11:57 | |
-So this is two plates of the Earth crust colliding? -Exactly. | 0:11:57 | 0:12:01 | |
In the hundreds of millions of years Anglesey has been moving around the globe, | 0:12:01 | 0:12:06 | |
collisions and splits in the Earth's crust have created an astonishing array of rocks. | 0:12:06 | 0:12:12 | |
It's not just geologists who love this landscape, | 0:12:12 | 0:12:17 | |
it's a paradise for climbers too. | 0:12:17 | 0:12:20 | |
The sea's worked away at the weaker rocks to create some of Britain's toughest cliff climbs. | 0:12:20 | 0:12:27 | |
Now I'm taking up the challenge to see these rocks as only climbers can. | 0:12:27 | 0:12:33 | |
But before the ascent, I've got an exhilarating 100-foot descent in prospect. | 0:12:33 | 0:12:40 | |
Fortunately, Libby Peter and Graham Desroy know their ropes. | 0:12:40 | 0:12:46 | |
I guess, is it the nature of cliff climbing that you're always going | 0:12:46 | 0:12:49 | |
to start by going down before you can come up? | 0:12:49 | 0:12:51 | |
Yeah, it's a bit back-to-front. Normally you climb a mountain | 0:12:51 | 0:12:53 | |
and then abseil down again, | 0:12:53 | 0:12:55 | |
but sea cliffs it's the reverse, you commit yourself by abseiling in and then you have to climb out again. | 0:12:55 | 0:13:03 | |
It does look amazing when you just disappear into the... | 0:13:03 | 0:13:06 | |
Yeah, it's like you're abseiling straight into the sea. | 0:13:06 | 0:13:09 | |
Yeah, it does. See you down there. | 0:13:09 | 0:13:11 | |
OK, will do. | 0:13:11 | 0:13:13 | |
Here goes. It's a very long way down. | 0:13:13 | 0:13:17 | |
The rock is now very dry and storm battered. | 0:13:23 | 0:13:27 | |
It's as if it's been scoured clear of vegetation. | 0:13:27 | 0:13:30 | |
That's pretty exciting. | 0:13:34 | 0:13:36 | |
-Is this where we start traversing round or...? -That's right. | 0:13:36 | 0:13:40 | |
You know you're close to the sea when the spray starts whacking you in the face. | 0:13:42 | 0:13:47 | |
Hello, Libby. | 0:13:47 | 0:13:48 | |
What do you think? | 0:13:48 | 0:13:51 | |
Well, it beats sitting on a beach! | 0:13:51 | 0:13:53 | |
Just awesome, it's architecturally massive. | 0:13:53 | 0:13:57 | |
Takes your breath away. | 0:13:57 | 0:13:59 | |
The old heart's going. | 0:13:59 | 0:14:02 | |
The pros rate this climb as "very severe". | 0:14:04 | 0:14:08 | |
I can't tell you what I call it. | 0:14:12 | 0:14:13 | |
I can see all the incredible folds of rock, it's been bent like a piece of paper. | 0:14:17 | 0:14:23 | |
I mustn't get too distracted, I'm meant to be climbing. | 0:14:23 | 0:14:27 | |
I've been following this band of quartz all the way up. | 0:14:27 | 0:14:31 | |
Here it is, | 0:14:31 | 0:14:33 | |
glistening white in the sunshine, it's very beautiful. | 0:14:33 | 0:14:36 | |
Thank you so much. | 0:14:54 | 0:14:56 | |
That was sensational. | 0:14:58 | 0:15:00 | |
Thank you so much, it's such an honour to be taken up by the two of you. | 0:15:04 | 0:15:09 | |
I was so impressed with the way you climbed it, it was brilliant, it really was. | 0:15:09 | 0:15:13 | |
While Nick's hanging off the edge of the Irish Sea, | 0:15:18 | 0:15:21 | |
I'm right at its heart on the Isle of Man. | 0:15:21 | 0:15:25 | |
The Manx economy depends on its transport links, how well it's connected to the wider world. | 0:15:30 | 0:15:36 | |
Tourists have been hopping over to the Isle of Man | 0:15:39 | 0:15:41 | |
since steam ship services started nearly 200 years ago. | 0:15:41 | 0:15:45 | |
Now, this tax haven also thrives thanks to this strip of tarmac with 40,000 flights a year. | 0:15:47 | 0:15:55 | |
And they're making the runway longer. | 0:15:56 | 0:16:00 | |
Now, the obvious thing to do would be to extend the tarmac in that direction inland. | 0:16:01 | 0:16:07 | |
But there's a problem. There's a road and houses smack bang in the path, | 0:16:07 | 0:16:11 | |
so instead what they've had to do is to extend in that direction, straight into the Irish Sea. | 0:16:11 | 0:16:17 | |
Adding 240 metres to the runway | 0:16:18 | 0:16:23 | |
means creating a big new patch of coast. | 0:16:23 | 0:16:26 | |
To shield this virgin shore from the sea they've brought in rugged Norwegian granite. | 0:16:26 | 0:16:33 | |
At 42 tonnes each, these blocks are the size of a van. | 0:16:33 | 0:16:38 | |
Anything smaller would be washed away by the waves. | 0:16:38 | 0:16:42 | |
Building the future can mean unearthing the past. | 0:16:42 | 0:16:47 | |
Preparing the ground for the new runway they discovered part of a prehistoric village. | 0:16:48 | 0:16:55 | |
The footings of at least six large roundhouses, | 0:16:55 | 0:16:59 | |
and close by, a child, with two adults. | 0:17:01 | 0:17:05 | |
People from the Bronze Age, some 3-4,000 years ago, but new finds go back even further. | 0:17:07 | 0:17:14 | |
So where are we, what are we sitting in the middle of? | 0:17:15 | 0:17:19 | |
Well, we're sat in the middle of a Mesolithic house, which is 7-8,000 years old, we believe. | 0:17:19 | 0:17:24 | |
Do you think that this house is on its own? | 0:17:24 | 0:17:27 | |
No, we've got every reason to believe that there are other houses. | 0:17:27 | 0:17:30 | |
I think that maybe you could imagine a family or an extended family group | 0:17:30 | 0:17:34 | |
living in each of the structures, that we're looking at a community of some size at that time. | 0:17:34 | 0:17:39 | |
Ironically, in the chaos of a 21st century building site | 0:17:40 | 0:17:45 | |
they've discovered the domestic bliss of our earliest settlers. | 0:17:45 | 0:17:49 | |
4,000 years before Stonehenge people were building houses here. | 0:17:49 | 0:17:55 | |
This is one of Britain's first grand designs, topped off with a sealskin roof. | 0:17:55 | 0:18:02 | |
Our hunter-gatherer ancestors were giving up their wandering ways | 0:18:02 | 0:18:06 | |
to settle down at home, with the coast close by for food. | 0:18:06 | 0:18:11 | |
This has always been a sought-after location. | 0:18:16 | 0:18:20 | |
800 years ago, the Vikings controlled these waters. | 0:18:20 | 0:18:25 | |
But in 1266, the Norse rulers moved on, selling the Isle of Man to the King of Scots, | 0:18:29 | 0:18:36 | |
and we're heading to Scotland in search of the Vikings' legacy, starting on a long finger of land. | 0:18:36 | 0:18:44 | |
This rocky shore pokes out into the Irish Sea. | 0:18:48 | 0:18:52 | |
Venture south and eventually the finger comes to a point. | 0:18:52 | 0:18:57 | |
The Mull of Galloway, Scotland's most southerly spot. | 0:18:59 | 0:19:04 | |
To me as a kid this was Land's End. | 0:19:04 | 0:19:07 | |
Coming to this coast as a wee boy gave me a passion for digging into the past. | 0:19:12 | 0:19:18 | |
The Vikings didn't leave much building work behind. | 0:19:22 | 0:19:26 | |
The castles are a later addition. | 0:19:26 | 0:19:28 | |
But something of the Norsemen's culture does survive at Annan, | 0:19:32 | 0:19:38 | |
an ancient form of fishing still hanging on. | 0:19:38 | 0:19:42 | |
My name is George Wilasy, I'm a half net fisherman, | 0:19:42 | 0:19:48 | |
and this is where | 0:19:48 | 0:19:51 | |
we do this type of fishing. | 0:19:51 | 0:19:52 | |
It's a Norse method and it was introduced here more than 1,000 years ago by the Vikings. | 0:19:54 | 0:20:00 | |
When the half netter goes across the sand to the water's edge | 0:20:00 | 0:20:06 | |
he's hunting for a place to catch a salmon or a sea trout or a grilse. | 0:20:06 | 0:20:14 | |
The best place is where the tide is coming hard onto the shore, | 0:20:14 | 0:20:19 | |
that's where the fish will be following the line of the tide. | 0:20:19 | 0:20:23 | |
I started half netting in 1956. | 0:20:25 | 0:20:29 | |
My father was a fisherman, my grandfather and his father, | 0:20:31 | 0:20:34 | |
they were all fishermen, and that knowledge had been passed onto us. | 0:20:34 | 0:20:38 | |
Sometimes a fish will go in, | 0:20:42 | 0:20:44 | |
and actually it's his tail that's touching it, and he's backing into | 0:20:44 | 0:20:50 | |
the net, so he's already pointing out of the net when you lift. | 0:20:50 | 0:20:53 | |
And they're extremely quick, so you have to be quick to lift the frame clear of the water. | 0:20:53 | 0:20:59 | |
The younger generation today, they're better educated, they're faster, they're stronger | 0:21:00 | 0:21:06 | |
and yet they couldn't do what these old people used to do. | 0:21:06 | 0:21:11 | |
I'm not one of these old people yet, mind! | 0:21:11 | 0:21:14 | |
It's part of our heritage and heritage is a scarce thing, we should never lose heritage. | 0:21:18 | 0:21:25 | |
You're never far from a fisherman on the Irish Sea. | 0:21:29 | 0:21:34 | |
Boats of every shape and size ply these waters. | 0:21:34 | 0:21:37 | |
Home port for many is on the Isle of Man. | 0:21:49 | 0:21:53 | |
Whatever their craft, all sailors share a common bond | 0:22:01 | 0:22:05 | |
and Douglas harbour shelters a tragic reminder of those in peril on the sea. | 0:22:05 | 0:22:11 | |
Wrecks usually remain on the seabed, | 0:22:15 | 0:22:19 | |
but cradled by the sea wall at Douglas is a boat that was raised | 0:22:19 | 0:22:22 | |
because of the awful circumstances of her sinking. | 0:22:22 | 0:22:26 | |
The wreck of that scallop dredger, the Solway Harvester, is a chilling sight. | 0:22:28 | 0:22:32 | |
It's a terrible reminder of the price that fishermen sometimes pay for the bounty of the sea. | 0:22:32 | 0:22:39 | |
Seven men drowned when that ship sank, the entire crew lost. | 0:22:39 | 0:22:45 | |
On the night of January 11th 2000, as a storm was raging, | 0:22:46 | 0:22:51 | |
the Solway Harvester sought shelter off the Isle of Man, | 0:22:51 | 0:22:55 | |
but she vanished without trace. | 0:22:55 | 0:22:58 | |
There was no mayday call, her disappearance a complete mystery. | 0:22:59 | 0:23:05 | |
At her home port on Scotland's southern shore, they honour the seven men of the Solway Harvester. | 0:23:06 | 0:23:12 | |
Robin Mills was one of the crew on the stricken scallop boat. | 0:23:12 | 0:23:18 | |
Robin's wife, Karen, was with her family, waiting for news of her husband. | 0:23:18 | 0:23:23 | |
Five o'clock in the morning press were arriving and you were beginning to think | 0:23:23 | 0:23:27 | |
this is getting scarier, this is maybe real, because you still had a | 0:23:27 | 0:23:30 | |
hope at five o'clock in the morning that they would be found. There was | 0:23:30 | 0:23:34 | |
nothing confirmed at that stage, so I think at six o'clock somebody persuaded us to | 0:23:34 | 0:23:39 | |
try and rest, probably because I was pregnant at the time and they were worried about me. | 0:23:39 | 0:23:43 | |
And I can remember helicopters, you know that | 0:23:43 | 0:23:48 | |
sort of vibration of the helicopter noise out.. | 0:23:48 | 0:23:51 | |
We could hear that outside and we realised what they were doing. | 0:23:51 | 0:23:54 | |
We prayed and hoped that they might just be bobbing about in life rafts somewhere. | 0:23:54 | 0:23:59 | |
RADIO: "And the weather I think will match the mood of the town as it awakes to the..." | 0:23:59 | 0:24:03 | |
It was a very, grey, grey dismal day. | 0:24:03 | 0:24:05 | |
But I remember, it was January so it doesn't get light early, | 0:24:05 | 0:24:08 | |
and it would be quarter to eight, I think, in the morning we got a phone call to say that | 0:24:08 | 0:24:13 | |
they'd found both life rafts, so there was no hope then. | 0:24:13 | 0:24:18 | |
Karen's husband, Robin, had perished along with his six crewmates. | 0:24:18 | 0:24:22 | |
He wasn't even a regular hand on the boat. | 0:24:22 | 0:24:25 | |
-Robin wasn't a fisherman at all. -No, he wasn't. | 0:24:25 | 0:24:27 | |
He was a painter and decorator but his brother was a fisherman. | 0:24:27 | 0:24:30 | |
Craig phoned to say he was very short of crew. | 0:24:30 | 0:24:33 | |
I think some of the crew members were sick or hadn't turned up and he was asked to help. | 0:24:33 | 0:24:39 | |
I don't think he was particularly keen to go, but it was just one of these things. | 0:24:39 | 0:24:44 | |
It's just bad luck and bad luck and bad luck. | 0:24:44 | 0:24:46 | |
Mm-hm. | 0:24:46 | 0:24:47 | |
When the Solway Harvester was found on the seabed, the Manx Government had the vessel raised | 0:24:51 | 0:24:57 | |
to recover the bodies, and returned to the Isle of Man to investigate the mysterious sinking. | 0:24:57 | 0:25:03 | |
After eight years of legal wrangles over the evidence, in 2008 | 0:25:08 | 0:25:13 | |
the coroner ruled the seven deaths had been accidental. | 0:25:13 | 0:25:17 | |
The scallop boat had flooded in foul weather. | 0:25:17 | 0:25:20 | |
In the calm after the storm | 0:25:23 | 0:25:26 | |
she finally sits in a safe haven beyond the reach of the sea that claimed her. | 0:25:26 | 0:25:31 | |
Out from the Isle of Man we continue our wheel around the Irish Sea, in England with Alice. | 0:25:42 | 0:25:49 | |
The Solway Firth separates the Scots from the English. | 0:25:53 | 0:25:57 | |
England begins in the mud with the promise of mountains to come. | 0:25:57 | 0:26:03 | |
These beautiful beaches don't attract the crowds | 0:26:03 | 0:26:06 | |
like Blackpool further south, but you can still get a cornet. | 0:26:06 | 0:26:11 | |
You won't sell many ice creams at that speed! | 0:26:11 | 0:26:15 | |
Only a short drive away, the peaks of the Lake District are tantalisingly close. | 0:26:15 | 0:26:22 | |
Wastwater is the deepest lake in England, | 0:26:22 | 0:26:25 | |
and just behind is Scafell Pike, the highest mountain in England, | 0:26:25 | 0:26:31 | |
but the big story of this shore is sand. | 0:26:31 | 0:26:36 | |
Morecambe Bay, the largest expanse of inter-tidal mudflats in Britain, | 0:26:36 | 0:26:41 | |
fun for some, | 0:26:41 | 0:26:43 | |
an obstacle to others. | 0:26:44 | 0:26:47 | |
Morecambe Bay covers 120 square miles. | 0:26:47 | 0:26:50 | |
A long detour unless you brave the perilous path over the sand. | 0:26:50 | 0:26:56 | |
Before the railway arrived, horse-drawn carriages sometimes | 0:26:59 | 0:27:02 | |
got stuck, with tragic results, as they tried to race across the mud. | 0:27:02 | 0:27:07 | |
These sandbanks feel so solid I can see why people might think about | 0:27:12 | 0:27:16 | |
taking a short cut across them, but they're also incredibly treacherous. | 0:27:16 | 0:27:20 | |
SIREN WAILS The siren warns the unwary that the tide's turning. | 0:27:20 | 0:27:25 | |
It rushes in at about nine miles an hour, twice the speed | 0:27:25 | 0:27:30 | |
of a brisk walk, flooding the bay in up to 30 foot of water. | 0:27:30 | 0:27:35 | |
And a hidden danger lurks to hold you fast as the sea surges in - | 0:27:35 | 0:27:40 | |
quicksand. | 0:27:40 | 0:27:43 | |
What turns soft sand, so nice between the toes, into a sticky sludge | 0:27:45 | 0:27:51 | |
that can cement you to the spot, unable to escape its grip? | 0:27:51 | 0:27:56 | |
Shortly I'll shun the safety of the path and get stuck in the mud myself. | 0:27:56 | 0:28:01 | |
To see exactly what I'll be getting myself into we're making some DIY quicksand. | 0:28:01 | 0:28:09 | |
Sedimentologist Jeff Peakall and his team from Leeds University are building up layers of sand | 0:28:09 | 0:28:15 | |
which can be saturated with water, flowing in from underneath. | 0:28:15 | 0:28:20 | |
Now you've got a tube of experimental quicksand here, but what is it when it occurs naturally? | 0:28:20 | 0:28:26 | |
Quicksand is really where you change from a solid state | 0:28:26 | 0:28:29 | |
into a liquid state, really rapidly, almost instantaneously. | 0:28:29 | 0:28:33 | |
And can it be any type of sand with water flowing through it? | 0:28:33 | 0:28:36 | |
No, it needs one with lots of holes in so it needs to be nice | 0:28:36 | 0:28:40 | |
round grains, ideally all grains of the same size. | 0:28:40 | 0:28:44 | |
What we're going to do here is run a quick experiment | 0:28:44 | 0:28:47 | |
and I'm going to put a model digger truck in here. | 0:28:47 | 0:28:51 | |
So the sand seems to be supporting the weight of that very well at the moment. | 0:28:51 | 0:28:53 | |
We're going to add a little bit of water, from underneath. | 0:28:53 | 0:28:57 | |
We've got some water flowing in through here, but it remains solid | 0:28:57 | 0:29:00 | |
for a period of time, and then suddenly it turns into a liquid, and our digger | 0:29:00 | 0:29:04 | |
is disappearing into the sand, just as the sand has gone from a solid into a liquid. | 0:29:04 | 0:29:10 | |
Yes, it's not just going underwater, it's actually sinking into the sand. | 0:29:10 | 0:29:15 | |
If you as you walk on it, you just add that extra shaking | 0:29:15 | 0:29:19 | |
vibration, that's just enough to break the grains apart. | 0:29:19 | 0:29:22 | |
So one of the factors producing the sinking effect in quicksand is actually the movement of the person. | 0:29:22 | 0:29:27 | |
Yes, and then if you begin to sink in and you start to wriggle, then you increase the effect | 0:29:27 | 0:29:32 | |
and you'll actually sink further. So one of the difficult things for the person falling | 0:29:32 | 0:29:36 | |
into quicksand must be to try and remain relatively still. | 0:29:36 | 0:29:41 | |
This will be me in a minute, sinking in. | 0:29:41 | 0:29:44 | |
The secret for survival is to spread your weight over the surface, so instead of tyres | 0:29:44 | 0:29:50 | |
the truck that's taking me out is on tracks. | 0:29:50 | 0:29:54 | |
It's one of the few vehicles you could actually take out onto the sands with confidence and knowing | 0:29:54 | 0:29:59 | |
that you would get back safely, and that's all because of its huge wide tracks underneath. | 0:29:59 | 0:30:05 | |
We've actually gone out of this vehicle before and | 0:30:05 | 0:30:07 | |
stepped onto the sand and sunk and the vehicle's been sat on the top. | 0:30:07 | 0:30:11 | |
Volunteer Garry Parsons set up Bay Search & Rescue | 0:30:11 | 0:30:15 | |
after witnessing the galloping tide almost kill a man stuck in the mud. | 0:30:15 | 0:30:19 | |
The sand was so hard you couldn't drive your fingers into it down by the side of his legs. | 0:30:19 | 0:30:23 | |
We thought we were going to watch this guy drown right in front of us. | 0:30:23 | 0:30:27 | |
Now these versatile vehicles provide rapid response, | 0:30:27 | 0:30:31 | |
taking the most direct route to strugglers on the sand. | 0:30:31 | 0:30:35 | |
Down we go. | 0:30:35 | 0:30:36 | |
That is incredibly steep. | 0:30:36 | 0:30:39 | |
Bay Search & Rescue and the on-site coastguard are preparing | 0:30:48 | 0:30:51 | |
for a spot of quicksand training, and I'm going to be the guinea pig. | 0:30:51 | 0:30:56 | |
Starting to have second thoughts about this. | 0:30:59 | 0:31:02 | |
Lovely bit of quicksand we stumbled across this morning for you. | 0:31:02 | 0:31:05 | |
-Right. -Off you go, jump in. | 0:31:05 | 0:31:07 | |
OK. | 0:31:07 | 0:31:09 | |
If I'm going to get myself in here, you better get me out before the tide comes in. | 0:31:09 | 0:31:13 | |
No worries. | 0:31:13 | 0:31:14 | |
That feels quite firm... at the moment. | 0:31:16 | 0:31:20 | |
I'm just moving my ankles, I reckon, and there's some water there. | 0:31:20 | 0:31:24 | |
The mud is just there, can I get my foot out? | 0:31:24 | 0:31:26 | |
What's really horrible and produces this rising sense of panic, | 0:31:33 | 0:31:39 | |
you're trying to move and you're trying to work yourself free, and every time you're moving your foot | 0:31:39 | 0:31:43 | |
and agitating the silt around you, you can just feel yourself sinking in further. | 0:31:43 | 0:31:49 | |
It really is solid, I reckon I can lean right back | 0:31:49 | 0:31:53 | |
and just stay in the silt. | 0:31:53 | 0:31:56 | |
It's got me good and proper, that really is quite scary. | 0:31:57 | 0:32:03 | |
It's very scary, | 0:32:03 | 0:32:05 | |
you can just imagine being here and the tide coming in, | 0:32:05 | 0:32:08 | |
nobody around for miles, I just can't move. | 0:32:08 | 0:32:12 | |
'The sand roots you to the spot, and then the sea rises over your head. | 0:32:16 | 0:32:23 | |
'That's why these guys race against the tide.' | 0:32:27 | 0:32:30 | |
OK, Alice, we'll soon have you out. | 0:32:30 | 0:32:34 | |
The only way to release me is to liquefy the sand. | 0:32:34 | 0:32:38 | |
First they loosen it up and then turn it into a liquid by adding more water. | 0:32:38 | 0:32:42 | |
-I'm a bit worried about sinking further in. -You won't go any further. | 0:32:42 | 0:32:46 | |
Is that coming out? It's coming. | 0:32:53 | 0:32:56 | |
That's one. | 0:32:58 | 0:33:00 | |
-OK? -Yeah. | 0:33:02 | 0:33:03 | |
-Thank you very much. -You're welcome. | 0:33:11 | 0:33:14 | |
It's great to be free. | 0:33:17 | 0:33:21 | |
Despite the dangers, if you stick within safe limits, | 0:33:21 | 0:33:25 | |
this is a paradise for playing around. | 0:33:25 | 0:33:29 | |
We love the seaside so much we'll pay for its pleasures. | 0:33:32 | 0:33:36 | |
Sand and scares can be a winning combination. | 0:33:40 | 0:33:46 | |
Further south at Sefton Sands, they have their own thrill rides. | 0:33:54 | 0:33:59 | |
Then big, long beaches give way to a big, bold city... | 0:34:02 | 0:34:08 | |
Liverpool. | 0:34:09 | 0:34:12 | |
The Mersey might be muddy, but where there's muck, there's brass, or maybe iron. | 0:34:14 | 0:34:20 | |
An iron ship, as Mark's about to find out. | 0:34:20 | 0:34:25 | |
In 1888, the world's largest ship was making her way up the Mersey, | 0:34:25 | 0:34:31 | |
the SS Great Eastern. | 0:34:31 | 0:34:34 | |
It was the final engineering triumph of Isambard Kingdom Brunel. | 0:34:34 | 0:34:39 | |
But this wasn't her maiden voyage, it was her last. | 0:34:41 | 0:34:46 | |
The Great Eastern had been launched 30 years earlier in 1858. | 0:34:48 | 0:34:54 | |
Built for nonstop travel to Australia, | 0:34:56 | 0:34:59 | |
she was nearly twice the length of any other ship, | 0:34:59 | 0:35:03 | |
the largest moveable thing men had ever made. | 0:35:03 | 0:35:07 | |
And Brunel was the man that designed her. | 0:35:09 | 0:35:12 | |
This is the most famous of all the images of Brunel. | 0:35:14 | 0:35:18 | |
Look, he has his stovepipe hat, his cigar, behind him the drag chains of the Great Eastern. | 0:35:18 | 0:35:25 | |
But he's actually a real engineer because, look, he's got mud on his trousers. | 0:35:25 | 0:35:31 | |
His plan for the Great Eastern specified a revolutionary double skin iron hull, | 0:35:31 | 0:35:37 | |
but her massive size also made her massively over-budget. | 0:35:37 | 0:35:43 | |
Building his masterpiece took a terrible toll on Brunel. | 0:35:43 | 0:35:49 | |
A week after the Great Eastern's trial voyage, he died, following a stroke. | 0:35:49 | 0:35:55 | |
His great liner fared little better. | 0:35:56 | 0:35:59 | |
Smaller, faster ships captured the passenger trade she was built for. | 0:35:59 | 0:36:05 | |
Her last journey was down the Mersey | 0:36:05 | 0:36:09 | |
to become a floating billboard advertising a local department store. | 0:36:09 | 0:36:15 | |
If Brunel had seen it thus he would have cried. | 0:36:15 | 0:36:19 | |
Finally, the ship that had broken Brunel's heart | 0:36:21 | 0:36:24 | |
was herself to be broken up for scrap. | 0:36:24 | 0:36:29 | |
Too big for the breaker's yard she was beached on the banks of the Mersey. | 0:36:29 | 0:36:34 | |
Marine archaeologist Mike Stammers is showing me her last resting place. | 0:36:37 | 0:36:42 | |
So this is a contemporary photograph? | 0:36:42 | 0:36:45 | |
Yes, of the Great Eastern on New Ferry Beach. | 0:36:45 | 0:36:48 | |
She's looking at an angle, isn't she? | 0:36:48 | 0:36:49 | |
-Yes, and we're standing right near the bow. -What, just there? | 0:36:49 | 0:36:54 | |
Yeah, two tiny little people looking up at this towering bow. | 0:36:54 | 0:36:59 | |
-It would have been right up there. -Yeah, right up into the sky blocking out the skyline behind. | 0:36:59 | 0:37:04 | |
This mountain of wrought iron was a valuable prize for the scrap metal men, | 0:37:04 | 0:37:09 | |
but the old girl wasn't going to go down without a struggle. | 0:37:09 | 0:37:14 | |
What they hadn't bargained for was the workmanship of Brunel. | 0:37:14 | 0:37:18 | |
She was so well built it took them nearly two years to break it up. | 0:37:18 | 0:37:22 | |
So rather than making a big profit they made a loss. | 0:37:22 | 0:37:24 | |
They made a thumping great loss. | 0:37:24 | 0:37:27 | |
And, of course, the actual process of breaking her up must have been terribly hard work. | 0:37:27 | 0:37:32 | |
Oh, yes, because they had no oxyacetylene in those days, | 0:37:32 | 0:37:35 | |
it was a case of sledgehammers and coal chisels, | 0:37:35 | 0:37:38 | |
and a great big iron wrecking ball that they dropped onto the plates, and hoped to smash them apart. | 0:37:38 | 0:37:43 | |
200 men, sometimes working day and night, | 0:37:43 | 0:37:47 | |
needed two years to smash the ship to bits. | 0:37:47 | 0:37:52 | |
Surely some scrap must have sunk down into the silt. | 0:37:54 | 0:38:00 | |
Mike is off to try and find pieces of Brunel's liner buried in the mud, | 0:38:00 | 0:38:07 | |
but I'm going down river | 0:38:07 | 0:38:10 | |
to where they're still breaking up ships. | 0:38:10 | 0:38:13 | |
I want to see how things have moved on in the 120 years | 0:38:14 | 0:38:20 | |
since the Great Eastern was battered to death near here. | 0:38:20 | 0:38:24 | |
Former Falklands warship HMS Intrepid arrived six months ago to be broken up. | 0:38:27 | 0:38:35 | |
-Where's the ship? -Well, HMS Intrepid came in here in January, and this is all you've got left. | 0:38:35 | 0:38:42 | |
It looks like chaos, but presumably it's all terribly organised. | 0:38:42 | 0:38:45 | |
Everybody knows what they're doing, we've most probably got about 12 guys down here. | 0:38:45 | 0:38:50 | |
We've got six machines working, we're processing copper, brass, cable, aluminium. | 0:38:50 | 0:38:56 | |
Another eight weeks, this will be completely cleared, | 0:38:56 | 0:38:59 | |
the lock gates will be opened, water will come in here, and hopefully two more vessels. | 0:38:59 | 0:39:05 | |
Just like for the Victorian ship breakers, time is still money, | 0:39:05 | 0:39:11 | |
speed is the difference between profit and loss. | 0:39:11 | 0:39:14 | |
But Brunel couldn't have imagined how his machine age would evolve to eat itself. | 0:39:14 | 0:39:22 | |
You can't crack up a ship without leaving some traces behind. | 0:39:24 | 0:39:29 | |
Back out in the mud, Mike thinks he's found a bit of Brunel's Great Eastern. | 0:39:34 | 0:39:39 | |
-This is what I spotted before, I think you'll be rather impressed with this. -Isn't that extraordinary? | 0:39:39 | 0:39:46 | |
It's a great big chunk of iron plate. | 0:39:46 | 0:39:48 | |
-Hang on, there's a trowel for you. -Thank you. | 0:39:48 | 0:39:50 | |
-There, look, look. -Solid as anything. | 0:39:50 | 0:39:53 | |
-How do you actually know this is the Great Eastern? -Well, the Great Eastern was | 0:39:53 | 0:39:58 | |
built of very thick plate, either three quarters of an inch or an inch thick, so if we get the callipers. | 0:39:58 | 0:40:06 | |
That looks pretty good. | 0:40:06 | 0:40:09 | |
-Look at that. -That's nearly an inch. | 0:40:09 | 0:40:11 | |
Nearly an inch. | 0:40:11 | 0:40:14 | |
-15/16. -So that's a good indicator. | 0:40:14 | 0:40:17 | |
It looks like it's running through to there, so if I try the other end, | 0:40:17 | 0:40:21 | |
looks like bits of rivet here as well. Look at those. | 0:40:21 | 0:40:27 | |
Look, I can just lift it out. | 0:40:29 | 0:40:32 | |
I've got my own row of rivets here as well. | 0:40:32 | 0:40:34 | |
Yeah, Great Eastern revealed. | 0:40:34 | 0:40:36 | |
There we are. Good Lord, bright metal. | 0:40:45 | 0:40:49 | |
Isn't that wonderful?! There it is, as fresh as it comes. | 0:40:51 | 0:40:57 | |
Some three million rivets held the Great Eastern together. | 0:40:57 | 0:41:02 | |
It seems a precious few are still holding fast 150 years later. | 0:41:02 | 0:41:09 | |
The struggle of building this iron leviathan broke Brunel, | 0:41:09 | 0:41:14 | |
but she's left him a fitting memorial, | 0:41:14 | 0:41:18 | |
ironwork of his masterpiece scattered in the mud of the Mersey. | 0:41:18 | 0:41:23 | |
In 1850, the metal merchants of the Mersey cast iron parts for a mighty machine. | 0:41:29 | 0:41:36 | |
And at the centre of the Irish Sea, out on the Isle of Man, it's still spinning. | 0:41:39 | 0:41:45 | |
We've come full circle, | 0:41:47 | 0:41:49 | |
back to the Laxey Wheel, | 0:41:49 | 0:41:51 | |
designed to pump floodwater from nearby mineshafts | 0:41:51 | 0:41:55 | |
and attract investors to pump money into the mining business. | 0:41:55 | 0:41:59 | |
And one of the investors in this mine is owed a huge debt of thanks by everyone who comes to the coast. | 0:42:02 | 0:42:10 | |
Sir William Hillary was appalled by the loss of life on the seas around the Isle of Man, | 0:42:12 | 0:42:18 | |
so he hatched a plan. | 0:42:18 | 0:42:20 | |
And what he came up with was this, the tower of refuge, | 0:42:21 | 0:42:26 | |
a sanctuary built for shipwrecked sailors in 1832. | 0:42:26 | 0:42:29 | |
Hillary ordered that it was to be built of the rudest and strongest | 0:42:29 | 0:42:33 | |
materials so that it could withstand the raging seas that often pound this reef. | 0:42:33 | 0:42:38 | |
Looks pretty sturdy to me. | 0:42:38 | 0:42:39 | |
Sailors wrecked on this reef could sit out a storm safe behind stone walls | 0:42:39 | 0:42:45 | |
but William Hillary's most towering achievement | 0:42:45 | 0:42:48 | |
is something even more enduring than this. | 0:42:48 | 0:42:52 | |
In 1823, he launched an appeal for a formation of a national institution | 0:42:52 | 0:42:57 | |
for the preservation of lives and property from shipwreck. | 0:42:57 | 0:43:00 | |
It took over a year, but eventually that national institution was | 0:43:00 | 0:43:04 | |
formed, and in 1854 it became the Royal National Lifeboat Institution. | 0:43:04 | 0:43:10 | |
Nearly two centuries later, the founder gives his name to | 0:43:19 | 0:43:23 | |
the boat that patrols Douglas Bay, where it all began. | 0:43:23 | 0:43:27 | |
Now all the seas around the British Isles are safer | 0:43:27 | 0:43:31 | |
thanks to over 300 RNLI Lifeboats and their volunteer crews. | 0:43:31 | 0:43:35 | |
Our voyage around home shores and beyond steams on next time towards the English Riviera. | 0:43:38 | 0:43:46 | |
Subtitles by Red Bee Media Ltd | 0:44:01 | 0:44:04 | |
E-mail [email protected] | 0:44:04 | 0:44:07 |