CAUSE OF HEAVY SEAS IN IRISH CHANNEL.
In a report to the Right Honourable Viscount Cathcart, Commander of His Majesty’s Forces, made on Portpatrick harbour in 1812, he gives the following explanation of the well-known rough sea between Portpatrick and Donaghadee:—
“In describing the harbour of Portpatrick, it may be noticed that although the coast on which it is situated is not directly exposed to the Atlantic Ocean, yet the opposing tides of the north and south channels meet there and separate to flow up the Clyde and Solway Firths, which, independent of storms, must occasion a very considerable commotion in the waters of the channel between Portpatrick and Donaghadee.
“Accordingly we find that the sea has made a great impression upon the coast of Wigtonshire; and though the shores between Loch Ryan and the Bay of Glenluce consist chiefly of whinstone (the greenstone of mineralogists), which is one of the most indestructible rocks we have, yet the figure of the coast is indented with many small cuts or creeks, and rocks are all along the shore found jutting into the sea. At the head of one of these creeks, which is about a hundred fathoms in length, and thirty fathoms in breadth, the harbour of Portpatrick is situated between two insulated rocks, upon one of which the piers are built, the harbour being formed by an excavation, chiefly in the solid rock.”