For 85 years there can have been few in Aberdeen who did not know of the Torry Coo. The Girdleness fog horn, a replacement for an earlier “coo” on the site, bellowed out its warning from 1902 till 1987, its sonorous lowing carrying to all parts of the city and beyond. Certainly as a student, both in Halls next to the Don and in a flat in the west-end, the Coo could be heard, droning through an Aberdeen pea-souper.
There is always something uncanny about fog, the indistinct shapes that eventually resolve into something commonplace, but at times seem to have the form of some eldritch creature, whose outline raises the hackles and adds to the cold, damp, chill. Worse still when the half-seen thing does not become more apparent as it is approached, but rather fades to nothingness, determined not to be seen clearly.
Through this the Coo’s bass bellow bludgeoned its way. Not a cutting sound, not one to pierce the fog and the head, but rather a brutish primordial sound, its drawn out blare aimed at the bowels. A sound to stir base fears and to stir base creatures. The Coo is said to have summoned forth from its lair in Greyhope Bay an ancient sea-monster, for whom the Coo’s call was that of a potential partner, and which swam, love-lorn, searching for its mate in the close seas off the harbour mouth, calling in response, and in vain.
Such was the Torry Coo, sadly silenced by the Commissioners of the Northern Lights in 1987 as radar and the enclosed nature of modern ships drove her to obsolescence. But the Coo still stares seaward, up on Girdleness, by the light, a grade A listed structure.
And yet, the Torry Coo is said to have come back to life on 27th February to warn the city of the incoming “Beast from the East” weather system. Scores of people across the city have reported hearing the Coo through that evening and night, and a number of pets (especially dogs) were said to have been driven daft by the sound.
All that Aberdeen Harbour Board will say about the reports is that there was an “incident” on the night of 27th February…
So, like Drake’s Drum is said to beat when England is in danger, did the Coo call to warn Aberdeen?
No audio or video of the Coo herself, but the Sumburgh foghorn is similar.
The Pole Road 