Sule Skerry

Infobox Scottish island |
latitude=59.08
longitude=-4.41
GridReference=HX621244
celtic name=
norse name=
meaning of name=
area=
area rank=
highest elevation=
Population=0
population rank=
main settlement=
island group= North Atlantic
local authority= Orkney
references= [2001 UK Census per List of islands of Scotland] Haswell-Smith, Hamish. (2004) The Scottish Islands. Edinburgh. Canongate.] [http://www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/ Ordnance Survey] ]

Sule Skerry is an extremely remote skerry in the North Atlantic off the north coast of Scotland.

Sule Skerry lies 60 kilometres west of the Orkney Mainland at gbmapping|HX621244. Sule Skerry's sole neighbour, Sule Stack, lies 10km to the southwest. The remote islands of Rona and Sula Sgeir lie further to the west.

Sule Skerry is 16ha in area and about 0.8 kilometres long along its length. There is a lighthouse at the northern tip of the island and a cairn at the southern tip.

According to the Guinness Book of Records, the Sule Skerry lighthouse was most remote manned lighthouse in Great Britain from its opening in 1895 to its automation in 1982. Its remote location meant that construction could only take place during the summer, thus it took from 1892-94 to complete.

A meteorological buoy used Met Office's Marine Automatic Weather Station (MAWS) Network is located off Skule Skerry. Results from the buoy are used in the Shipping Forecast.

Sule Skerry together with Sule Stack are listed as a Special Protection Area as they are home during the breeding season to thousands of puffins and gannets and smaller numbers of the rarer Leach's Storm Petrel and Storm Petrels.

Sule Skerry and Sule Stack are both a part of the Orkney Islands.

Every year the puffins on sule skerry are monitored by a team of birders called the sule skerry ringing group. They have been monitoring the seabirds on the island since the 70s.

References

External links

* [http://www.nlb.org.uk/ourlights/history/suleskerry.htm Sule Skerry Lighthouse]
* [http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/coast/buoy/index.shtml?co_sule_skerrybuoy Sule Skerry moored Buoy metrological recordings]