Disused underground oil storage facility

The Inchindown oil tanks is a disused underground oil depot in

Invergordon Invergordon (; gd, Inbhir Ghòrdain or ) is a town and port in Easter Ross, in Ross and Cromarty, Highland, Scotland. It lies in the parish of Rosskeen. History The town built up around the harbour which was established in 1828. The area beca ...

Ross-shire Ross-shire (; gd, Siorrachd Rois) is a historic county in the Scottish Highlands. The county borders Sutherland to the north and Inverness-shire to the south, as well as having a complex border with Cromartyshire – a county consisting o ...

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. The tanks hold the record for the longest reverberation in any man-made structure, surpassing the

Hamilton Mausoleum Hamilton Mausoleum is a mausoleum located in Hamilton, South Lanarkshire, Scotland. It was the resting place of the family of the Dukes of Hamilton.

History

The secret site was officially called "Inchindown, Royal Navy Fuel Tanks" and also known as the "Invergordon Oil Fuel Depot". The complex consists of six tanks: five were long, wide, with arched roofs high; a smaller sixth tank was of the same height and breadth but shorter. Work on the tanks began in 1938 and was completed in 1941. They were built to be a bomb-proof supply of furnace fuel oil to the Royal Navy's base at Invergordon. In 2014, the tanks were designated as a Category A

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern Irel ...

Reverberation record

In 2009, guided tours of the tanks were offered by Forestry Commission Scotland. After the tours were mentioned on BBC television programme ''

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'', professor of

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at the

University of Salford , caption = Coat of ArmsUniversity of Salford , mottoeng = "Let us seek higher things" , established = 1850 - Pendleton Mechanics Institute 1896 – Royal Technical Institute, Salford 1967 – gained ...

Trevor Cox was motivated to perform reverberation tests in the underground tanks. In 2014 Allan Kilpatrick from the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland fired a pistol blank inside one of the tanks. The sound was recorded by Cox, and is reported to have reverberated for 112 seconds at 125

hertz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that o ...

, 30 seconds at mid frequency, and 75 seconds broadband.

In popular culture

*In February 2019, photographers Simon Riddell and David Allen recorded a feature-length documentary inside the Inchindown oil facility. This documentary contains the only comprehensive tour of the facility. As part of the documentary, the photographers used a

large format camera Large format refers to any imaging format of or larger. Large format is larger than "medium format", the or size of Hasselblad, Mamiya, Rollei, Kowa, and Pentax cameras (using 120- and 220-roll film), and much larger than the frame o ...

to make one negative of the first tank. They then slept overnight in tunnel 2, which they turned into a darkroom the next day. They continued to create a darkroom print of their negative on location without leaving the underground facility. The film won 'best documentary with the UK Monthly Film Festival. *The Inchindown oil depot was featured in the "Swamp of Despair" episode of the

Science Channel Science Channel (often simply branded as Science; abbreviated to SCI) is an American pay television channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. The channel features programming focusing on science related to wilderness survival, engineering, man ...

's TV series ''Mysteries of the Abandoned'' (season 6, episode 2), first cablecast on April 2, 2020. * Susan Calman in the third series of the travel program, ''Secret Scotland'' went inside a fuel storage tank. * ''Watch the Sound With

Mark Ronson Mark Daniel Ronson (born 4 September 1975) is a British-American DJ, songwriter, record producer, and record executive. He is best known for his collaborations with artists such as Duran Duran, Amy Winehouse, Adele, Lady Gaga, Lily Allen, R ...

s episode on reverb goes to the Inchindown Oil Tanks. * '' Tom Scott'' and ''Matt Gray'' both made videos of the oil tank, amassing 4.4 million views combined.

References

External links

* Buildings and structures in Scotland Category A listed buildings in Highland (council area) Buildings and structures completed in 1941 Royal Navy bases in Scotland Subterranea of the United Kingdom Ross and Cromarty {{Subterranea