Inchindown: Raising the Swing-Arm

During my time photographing at Inchindown, an ex-M.O.D. top-secret underground fuel oil storage facility, I made a short video that documented when I re-instated one of the winches in tunnel one, reconnecting the original winching cable, installing some protection (in case the cable failed under load) with a view to attempting to raise the swing-arm pipe that was used to both fill and extract the heavy fuel oil.
The Inchindown facility is linked to an above ground oil storage facility located in Invergordon, which is where the heavy fuel oil was loaded from, and thereafter, pumped miles up into the hill. Inchindown had to be bomb-proof.
This project took considerable effort, but I felt confident that we could raise the swing-arm after all these years. It was probably last done during or slightly after WWII., or perhaps when it was decommissioned after the Falkland's.
Inchindown is a colossal feat of war-time engineering, and repairing the seized winching and pulley system gave us a very good insight into how the facility worked.
I couldn't have completed this project without the help of my best mate, Ian, who is truly awesome at all things fabrication and engineering. Whilst we were winching you can hear what appeared to be the cable fraying, the look in both our eyes shows our shared madness for these projects.
Further footage of Inchindown can be seen in the documentary I made with David Allen, called One Shot: Inchindown at www.inchindown.com

[@teamemusrcreviews3225]

I visited this facility within past 2 weeks on an official tour, available on FB, fascinating but not for those who are scared of confined spaces and going through tubes!!!! Many thanks to local Banerman Group for giving permission.

[@Christollet]

Good video there’s one in Portsmouth south England similar to this it has nine tanks 35 feet high and 6 of them are 240 metres long and two are 150 and 1 50 m long

[@Christollet]

It’s sealed and blocked up now