Off Topic Sea City - The Humber Estuary

Yes you are about right Fez, it certainly started to decline beginning of the seventies, when the last Cod war (1976) effectively finished deep sea trawling in Iceland. I was answering the question with my post, when was it that Hull barely had a fishing fleet left, which from memory was late 1980's early 1990's.

I working in Ullapool for 3 fishing season on the Mackerel early 1980's, and it was a thriving place with all the Eastern block processing factories there.

 

There's been a lot of water under the bridge since, John. My dad enjoyed Ullapool, my mum went up for visits. I have a memory of it having a drug problem, do you?

 

Didn't come across a drug problem, though there was plenty of alcohol consumed.

 

Aye, my dad would have been on that team, he liked a pint and a dram. A bit of Googling came up with rampant drug smuggling, I think it was a Trevor MacDonald program early 90s.

 

It certainly wouldn't surprise me, it was an ideal spot for such things to happen. During that period I was there the locals made a fortune, it was fondly know as a Klondike like the gold rush.

 

Yes by then even the fish coming on to the market was by container from Iceland, not from local vessels

 

Thanks for the pointer.

About as good as we can hope for in modern so called documentaries I suppose. So superficial and with what appears to now be obligatory false jeopardy thrown in for our excitement. With a voice over that would be more appropriate for a nursery class.

I hope for better from the Big Lil program but can't find it on iplayer. I think there must be local versions of the program Inside Out and the main BBC iplayer, as to be expected, shows the London and SE version.

Looking forward to the Headscarf Revolutionaries film. Hope they don't "sex it up" too much.

Interesting little clip from Pathe News about the triple disaster: Some of you might recognise some faces.-

http://www.britishpathe.com/video/hull-trawler-men-aka-3-trawlers-lost-at-sea-wives

A few of the crew look familiar to me but I don't know any names.

My dad would have though. He worked in the Boston Deep Sea Fisheries bunker station around that time and just prior to the collapse of the industry.

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Is the building still standing? It was never a beauty but I was always impressed how square and solid it looked in such an exposed position.

More likely to have been replaced by more of the comedy architecture which now seems so popular I expect.

edit...

Just noticed on re reading what a moaning old git I have become. My apologies.

 

I had the same problem, but found it. When on IPlayer, go to the A-Z tab, then pick "I" and you'll see the "Inside Out" regional variations. There are about 4 or 5 current month episodes on there from Yorkshire/Lincs region.. Spent a couple of enjoyable hours this morning watching the set. It's an excellent series imo.

 

IBut you are right on the way documentaries have changed in recent years , tbut that's a discussion for another thread ..
On people's memories about the decline in the industry ,it had me put two n two together as to why as a young kid ,my uncle went from working at sea to working for BP around the world- I'd never thought about it before now.

 

Quite enjoyed it, whether it would have been interesting if you are not from the area I somehow doubt. I see Mr Allam got his name in the lime light again.

 

It's a little known fact the the fate of Hull's deep sea fishing industry was sealed in a meeting at Blundell Park , Grimsby between Henry Kissinger the American
Secretary of State and Grimsby MP and the then Foreign Secretary Anthony Crossland. It was the height of the Cold War and Iceland threatened to Close the
NATO anti submarine Airbase at Keflavik. Unless Britain backed down in the Cod War. The result of the meeting was Keflavik remained open and three tiny
Gunboats got away with cutting the nets on countless Trawlers and defeating the might of the Royal Navy.

 

I enjoyed it, some nice long shots of the area too
We do need a cruise terminal, but I have dropped someone off there for a cruise and actually to be fair it's really well organised with really friendly staff
You pull your car up and someone is on hand to lift the bags out and put them into the vans. Doesn't look nice but it's slickly managed

 

I never heard that story before, however it would surprise me that some pressure was applied.

However from memory the Icelandic's did offer a reduced amount allowed to be caught, and stupidly the negotiators declined the offer, and they ended up with nothing.

I can remember the owner of one of the trawling companies who I worked for being furious , saying we needed to keep some presences there, which would have kept the door open.

 

See the links below to support the story

http://www1.american.edu/ted/icefish.htm - See section 1 & the last two paragraphs of section 2

http://www.everton.vitalfootball.co.uk/article.asp?a=57006 - See section revival during the Seventies.

 

Amazing. A Labour government minister and not Thatcher's fault.
Though, in the interest of balance , Heath sold out the rest of the fishing industry in his desperation to get into the EEC not a European Union, lying, as did Wilson about the realities of what this would entail in the long term.

 

I cant picture where that top building is

 

Same place as in the bottom pic.

At the St Andrews dock gates.

Laterly Sea Fish Industry Authority

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