Philorth Halt to Rathen: Wildlife Corridor

During the last few days the importance for wild birds of the habitat provided by the Line has become increasingly evident. The uncut vegetation along the trackway now has many ripe seed heads which attract a considerable range of birds. In the short section above broom, gorse knapweed, rosebay willowherb, spear thistle, rose hips burdock and various grasses dominate. There are also willows and occasionally sycamore, hawthorn and apple.

 At present the Line is teeming with bird life. This afternoon we watched a charm of goldfinches feasting on burdock seeds, siskins and a large flock of greenfinches enjoying the willowherbs. A robin, wrens, bluetits, tree sparrows and blackbirds, crows, rooks and assorted gulls were also present. Skeins of geese were constantly passing overhead, a few days ago an elegant line of six swans flew in from the sea.







Late flowering pink campion



There are frequently buzzards mewling as they wheel high over the woods at Carinbulg Castle and foolish pheasants crash about in the grass land. This damp  area is also home to curlews and lapwings. A pair of roe deer graze the fields close to the castle.

RNAS Lenabo

The connection between airships and the Formartine Buchan Way may not immediately be apparent but during WW1 there was a direct rail link from Longside Station to RNAS Lenabo, the most northerly of Britain's airship bases. (This is not to be confused with Longside Airfield) The remains of the airship station are extraordinary and worth a digression.

Memorial constructed from the remains of what is thought to have been the Officers' Mess at Lenabo

Lenabo Airship Station (RNAS Longside) was built in 1915 on a vast peat bog in order to provide allied shipping additional protection from German U boats operating in the North Sea. Lenabo consisted of 3 large airship sheds each 100 ft high, each protected by immense windbreak walls. In order to transport materials and personnel efficiently to the site a railway spur was constructed from Longside Station to the base. Over 32, 000 tons of  materials and stores were carried by train to Lenabo. The line was used exclusively for the base, ceased to operate in 1920 and existed only until 1923 when the trackway was removed. A small town consisting of support services, water tanks, gasworks, gasometers, barracks, canteens, a church and a theatre was rapidly constructed on the bog. Some of the peat extracted from the site was used to power the steam scoops, steam lorries, bucket cranes and locomotives used in constructing the site. Around 500 naval personnel were deployed on the site. The effectiveness of the airships is very much open to question and interest in airships generally waned after the war ended. The site was decommissioned in 1920, the buildings were flattened  but the concrete bases and larger chunks of concrete masonry remain mysteriously in what is now an extensive mature woodland.On November 11th 1918 it was a dispatch rider from Lenabo who took official news of the signing of the Armistice to the Peterhead Sentinel.

Following the route of one of the original roads a track from the main gate leads straight ahead to the hangars

The vast concrete floor of one of the airship hangars

The concrete panels which made up the enormous windbreaks remain, like collapsed dominoes, amongst the trees

Huge concrete mooring blocks were used to anchor the airships. The airships were called 'Lenabo soos' by the local farmers. Landing the airships involved everyone on the base,  including the station dog who was trained to assist by grabbing the end of the landing cable which, when thrown from the airship, inevitably landed in a tangled heap. The cable was then passed through an iron ring on a vast concrete block to prevent the airship from rising again.
Normally 100 naval ratings were needed then to manoeuvre the airships in to the sheds by hauling on the landing cable. It was almost impossible to handle the ships in bad weather. Each ship had an emergency panel which could be activated to deliberately  rip the casing causing the gas to escape and the ship to collapse. On 21st September 1918 two coastal airships landed in  a gale, even with 400 men on the ropes it was impossible to get the airships into the sheds in such  a strong wind and they had to be deliberately ripped.

 

On the right of the main gate a track, following the course of one of the original site roads, runs parallel to the main  road and leads to the remains of barracks, the gasworks, coal bunkers (pictured above) and water culverts.

Two of the many covered water culverts which led water  to - or from a large water storage tank related to the gasworks.