Sea State

Rough Sands. Sunk Head.  Tongue Sands. Knock John.

Nore. Red Sands. Shivering Sands.

These very English yet slightly mysterious names have the ring of made up weather forecasting areas, but in fact all refer to sea forts constructed during the Second World War to provide forward anti-aircraft defence for the Thames Estuary. Designated U1 through U7, they were also known as Maunsell Forts in recognition of their designer, Guy Maunsell. There were another three in the Mersey Estuary off Liverpool.

The Maunsell Forts came in two varieties. The first four listed above consisted of a large concrete platform mounted on two cylindrical towers. The latter three comprised several metal towers connected by walkways - in this design, five towers were mounted with guns, one with searchlights, and the seventh was the accommodation tower. The concrete forts, which were operated by the Royal Navy, mounted 2 quick-firing 37.5mm cannon and 2 Bofors 40mm guns, while the metal versions boasted an additional 2 QF guns and were under Army control.

It's from Wikipedia, so parts of it are in random languages....

By the 1950s the technology of warfare had rendered such gun platforms obsolete, and they were decommissioned. The vicissitudes of the North Sea soon began to eat away at the abandoned structures, but their stories were not quite finished...

Rough Sands (U1): In 1966, after new legislation had made pirate radio a criminal offence (see also Shivering Sands below), the operators of Radio Essex, Paddy Roy Bates, and Radio Caroline, Ronan O'Rahilly, seized control of the abandoned structure. They soon fell out, however, and an attempt by O'Rahilly to gain control of Rough Sands was repulsed by Bates, armed with guns and petrol bombs. Instructions from the British authorities to surrender the fort, which remained Crown property, were met with a declaration by Bates that the fort was now the sovereign territory of the micro-nation of Sealand. The so-called Principality of Sealand remains under Bates's control, despite a violent attempt by a Sealand "passport" holder, Alexander Achenbach, to take control, which involved hostage taking by both sides. Negotations for the Pirate Bay website to take it over fell through in 2007; Sealand are currently threatening to open an on-line casino sometime this year.

Sunk Head (U2): Demolished in the 1960s, after an attempt to set up the pirate station Radio Tower had failed owing to the inadequacy of the transmitter.

Tongue Sands (U3): Destroyed by storms in 1996.

Knock John (U4): Still standing. Seems to have been left alone by the radio pirates, possibly because it is the farthest out.

Yup, still standing: the Navy fort design as shown by Knock John.

Nore (U5): In 1953, when the fort was still operational, it was rammed by a Norwegian cargo ship, the MS Baalbek, resulting in four fatalities, and demolishing two of the towers. The remaining towers were subsequently demolished as a hazard to shipping, parts of the bases being beached at Cliffe in Kent where they may still be seen.

Red Sands (U6): Another fort that came to be utilised for pirate radio stations, in this case a station which called itself at various times Radio Invicta, KING Radio and Radio 390. It operated from 1965 to 1967. During that time, Red Sands was used to film a Danger Man episode called "Not So Jolly Roger", and after it was again abandoned, garnered another TV appearance in the Doctor Who episode "Fury From The Deep", where it represented an off-shore gas installation. Unfortunately this is one of those episodes the BBC didn't see fit to retain, and only brief clips survive, none of which seem to show the fort.

Red Sands, having survived the alien foam attack of 1968...

Shivering Sands (U7): One of the towers had collapsed after a collision with a boat, but in 1964, in the heyday of pirate radio, Screaming Lord Sutch seized the fort as a transmitter site for Radio Sutch. This was renamed Radio City when Sutch's manager Reg Calvert took it over. In June 1966, however, a planned association with Radio Caroline went spectacularly sour, culminating in a midnight visit by Calvert to the home of Caroline director Oliver Smedley during which Smedley shot Calvert dead. Smedley was later judged to have acted in self-defence, but the violent death of Reg Calvert played a major part in pushing the British government into acting against the pirates. Radio City shut down after Calvert's widow was charged under the new laws. For most of the subsequent years, Shivering Sands played host only to weather monitoring equipment, but in 2005 someone called Stephen Turner lived there for six weeks for artistic reasons. The towers are easily visible from Herne Bay in good weather, and I can remember them from my childhood in Kent.

An account of a boat trip to see Knock John, Shivering Sands and Red Sands, and with many photographs, is available here. And here's a little video of a visit to one of them:

Location not specified...

EDIT: Soundcloud link removed 2/1/2013