Windyheads Hill "Gee" Station, Aberdeenshire - July 2009

[Seahorse]

Windyheads was a slave station in the Northern Gee chain in Aberdeenshire. The master station was at Burifa Hill in Caithness, with Scousburgh in the Shetlands, and Sango in Sutherland being the other two slave stations.

Gee was a navigational aid to bombers carrying out operations in WW2, predating LORAN. The Northern chain was instrumental in aiding a very successful bombing raid on Berlin in 1943, although it was mainly used by aircraft on mine laying ops.

Not much to see here, but it's somewhere I have been meaning to visit for quite some time. In particular, I wanted to see the VHF/DF building. You'll see why in a mo.

Windyheads is still operational, currently used by NATS. RAF Buchan too had a presence, and whilst that buiding remains, is also now non operational.

The first thing you see approaching the site is a water tower. The buildings are long gone, with only the concrete footings remain...

Wandering around to the back, I came across this...

I didn't expect that, and imagined it had lain undisturbed for quite some time. WRONG...

OK, so it's been used to dump shite. Let's see if we can find the entrance.

It took a while, since it's buried in dense topiary. But here we are...

Just as I thought. Full of crap...

Time to go wandering and have a look at the rest of this rather extensive site.

 

[Seahorse]

Pipes. For. What???

Base. For. What???

In case of emergency? What, like running out of beer???

First building... Roofless and empty, I assume these were blast walls, with the internal buildings now completely gone???

More modern building. Note that the antenna array has been removed...

Time to move on again.

 

[Seahorse]

Remains of another Stanton shelter. No sign of the rest of it...

Getting closer to what I came to see. Several of these circle the structure. This one complete with deer poo...

Here we go. The VHF radio/Direction Finding building...

Lying in the undergrowth is the remains of the platform for the antenna array...

I am amazed that this wood and tar paper structure is still standing, exposed as it has been for decades to the fury of the weather in the North East of Scotland...

Very strange. The building is double walled, with the cavity having been filled with pea gravel. Why, I have no idea...

Old 5 amp mains socket...

The NATS site. Let's have a closer look...

 

[Seahorse]

Storage shed? Too flimsy to have been used as a sanger, and windows were glazed.

Concrete mast bases still remain...

And in the distance. WAY in the distance...

Quite a good bit away from the main site...

Almost every WW2 site I've ever visited has a teapot. What's that all about?

And on to the final couple of structures...

This one has been used as a makeshift air rifle range...

Thanks for looking. Not the most interesting of sites, but worth it just for the DF shack alone, I felt.

 

[zimbob]

...the DF shack alone, I felt.

I see what you did there

Liking this, the DF shack is a fantastically-shaped structure

 

[Seahorse]

I see what you did there

TAR very much.

 

[Runner]

Like that DF shed too - very unusual shape.

I think the walls filled with gravel might have been a low grade blast wall?
There's a blast wall at Driffield that has cracked - it's 2 walls infilled with stones, guess it would absorb the blast better than a solid wall.

 

[zimbob]

TAR very much.

ba-da-boom

 

[wolfism]

Interesting to see what's actually here … I parked the car on a wintry day and had a wander, but came to the conclusion that there wasn't much left intact.

 

[Seahorse]

Agreed. There are an awful lot of concrete bases dotted about, but not much left standing. It's certainly not somewhere you would want too travel far to visit.

 

[wolfism]

I was actually on my way back from seeing Buckie shipyard ... that must be nearly three years ago now. I posted a report about it on another forum, but it disappeared when I quit.

 

[jonney]

Nice report Seahorse. The walls of the DF building might have been lined with pea gravel to cut down interference or just to give it a bit of weight to stop the wind blowing it over