It was a bit windy here last night - one of those nights when you're lying in bed listening to the sound of the roof tiles rattling & rippling like a giant set of castanets. These are not lightweight tiles - they're big concrete tiles an inch thick, interlocking and doubled nailed at the top & clipped at the bottom. The wind simply lifts the whole roof slightly & shakes the house - quite a feat when the walls are 3 foot thick.
The highest recorded windspeed last night was 122mph at the top of the Hamars Hill in Evie, which is way off the Beaufort scale and comes in as a class three hurricane on the Saffir–Simpson Hurricane Scale. Most of Orkney had gusts of around 80mph even in the sheltered areas, which is comfortably hurricane force. As I say, a bit windy.
We didn't have much damage - a few broken slates on the lee side - the vacuum created by the wind hitting the other side is what seems to do the damage. Our hen hut is also still standing (it's well lashed down) though there's pictures on the BBC Radio Orkney facebook page of some less fortunate sheds.
http://www.orkneyarchaeologytours.co.uk
