This bell is mounted higher above the sea than any of the other bells. As a result, the wave-catcher exerts much greater forces on the clappers in the bell.
The huge tidal range at Appledore means that there is plenty of foreshore visible at low water.
Wikipedia goes into this in some detail. And here are illustrations at various states of the tide.
Trinity Buoy Wharf is an extraordinary place. In 1998 it was an empty, derelict site. Now it is a place with studios for people in the creative industries, workspace for people who work to provide transportation on the river, classrooms for education, and indoor and outdoor spaces for arts events and a wide range of activities from conferences to product launches.
With over 500 people working on the site, in enterprises large and small, established and start-up, mainstream and way-out, Trinity Buoy Wharf has been given a new life.
The brick buildings are the heritage structures that were built to by and for Trinity House, the organisation that designed, built and maintained the navigational equipment, buoys, lighthouses and lightships that kept Britain’s costal water safe.
The recent buildings were constructed to house the new creative industries using a simple, efficient and sustainable system based on shipping containers.
London’s Docklands changed dramatically with the move down river that was required by the introduction of the much larger ships. At the same time improved technology changed the business of providing navigational lights and Trinity House moved their workshops away from the Thames.
And, as in all creative enterprises, nothing stands still, things and the people doing them are constantly evolving. The mantra “always complete but never finished” fits Trinity Buoy Wharf today and will tomorrow.
With careful adaption and regeneration, Trinity Buoy Wharf has kept its character whilst offering modern amenities: studio and event space, a pier, two schools, rehearsal rooms, The Orchard Cafe and Fat Boy’s Diner and 40,000 sq ft of new, innovative and sustainable Container City buildings.
Although it has no link to the bell, Morecambe Bay is now known not least for a tragedy that took place on February 5, 2004.
David Anthony Eden, Sr., and David Anthony Eden, Jr., a father-and-son from England, had unlawfully hired a group of Chinese workers to pick cockles; they were to be paid £5 per 25 kg of cockles, (9p per lb), far less than the typical local rate at the time. The Chinese had been imported unlawfully via containers into Liverpool and were hired out through local criminal agents of international Chinese Triads. The cockles to be collected are best found at low tide on sand flats at Warton Sands, near Hest Bank. The Chinese workers were unfamiliar with local geography, language, and custom. They were cut off by the incoming tide in the bay around 9:30 p.m.
The emergency services were alerted by a mobile phone call made by one of the workers, who spoke little English and was only able to say "sinking water" before the call was cut off. Twenty-one bodies, of men and women between the ages of 18 and 45, were recovered from the bay after the incident. Two of the victims were women; the vast majority were young men in their 20s and 30s, with only two being over 40 and only one, a male, under 20. Most of the victims were previously employed as farmers, and two were fishermen. All the bodies were found between the cockling area and shore, indicating that most had attempted to swim but had been overcome by hypothermia. Four of the victims died after the truck they used to reach the cockling area became overwhelmed by water. A further two cocklers were believed to have been with those drowned, with remains of one being found in 2010.
At the subsequent hearing, British cocklers returning to shore on the same evening were reported to have attempted to warn the Chinese group by tapping their watches and trying to speak with them. A survivor testified that the leader of the group had made a mistake about the time of the tides. Fourteen other members of the group are reported to have made it safely to the shore, making 15 survivors in total. The workers were mainly from the Fujian province of China, and have been described as being untrained and inexperienced.
The text above is from Wikipedia
The bell is mounted above a stairway down to a shingle beach, exposed at low tide. This protects it from any possible damage from moored or passing ships at high tide.
Located just across the river from the O2 (formerly the Dome), and downstream from Canary Wharf, it's hard to imagine a more dramatic urban landscape for the bell.
Close inspection of the bell is best done at low tide; watch out - the steps, usually underwater, are extremely slippery....
The chemistry of the Dyfi estuary means that the bell has turned this beautiful shade of blue. Notice the seaweed, resulting from the tidal flow and relatively fresh water in the Dyfi.
A close-up of the patina developing from the seas off Anglesey
photo credit Millie Bower
At low tide in Summer
This relatively early photo shows the bell before it had begun to acquire the patina of the sea around Anglesey.
The mounting framework was contributed to the project by apprentices at the nearby Wylfa Nuclear Power Station - now closed.
Poem and translation by Gyndwr Thomas
(more…)Gillian Clarke, 2014 (then National Poet of Wales)
This poem was composed for and read at the dedication of the bell.
(more…)Due to its unique location, installing the bell needed help from a fishing boat.
