Lochaber Times, From our Files: August 13 2026

TWENTY-FIVE YEARS AGO
Thursday August 16 2001

Scanner for Belford approved

Belford Hospital in Fort William is to get a CT scanner after Highland Health Board approved a £60,000-a-year funding package for the running costs of the hi-tech equipment.

The news comes eight months after the North British Hotels Trust offered to fund the £325,000 cost of a scanner for the area.

A former mortuary has been accommodating the scanner but officials have revealed it will not be operational until early in the new year.

Lorn and Islands District General Hospital in Oban recently opened their scanner after an appeal was launched to provide running costs.

The running costs at the Belford are being met by the Highland Acute Hospitals Trust Endowment for the first three years, and by the NHS after that.

The scanner will mean the end of stroke and cancer patients having to go to Raigmore Hospital in Inverness for scans.

FIFTY YEARS AGO
Thursday August 12 1976

Mallaig faces death by 12-mile limit

Mallaig will probably cease to be a port of any consequence if the Government fails to win adequate fishing limits in its present EEC negotiations.

This clear warning is sounded in a development department report which went before the July meeting of the Highland Regional Council’s planning and development committee.

It goes further: ‘If the Limit which is eventually decided upon is nearer 12 than 50 miles there can be no doubt that the inshore fishing industry of the Region will be largely destroyed within a very few years.

"There will be very detrimental existing levels of investment and employment."

The report said the EEC talks were of vital concern to the Highlands. The inshore fishing industry was a regional resource of great importance, especially on the west coast, where the level of economic activity would otherwise be at a very low level.

The region’s fish stocks were already under threat from overfishing, and from a regional viewpoint the ideal fishery policy would involve an exclusive limit of perhaps 200 miles combined with strict conservation measures.

Talks with other EEC countries now centred on exclusive limits varying between 12 and 50 miles. Details were not available but it appeared that limits would vary from one area of coastline to another.

Mystery buyer for Mingulay

A mystery buyer, believed to be English, has purchased the Catholic church on the deserted island of Mingulay, off Barrahead.

Uninhabited since 1909, the island is owned by a syndicate of Barra crofters.

Now islanders are wondering what plans the buyer, thought to be a teacher, has for the church.

ONE HUNDRED YEARS AGO
Saturday August 14 1926

Funerals of Ballachulish quarrymen

The bodies of John Livingstone, foreman, and Angus Macinnes, quarrymen, the victims of the explosion at Craighmor Quarries, Aberfoyle, on 26th June, were recovered on Thursday of last week.

The search party had been working on the debris under which the bodies lay since the explosion. The relatives here kept in close touch with the operations throughout, and it was a great relief to them and the community when news came of the recovery of the bodies.

The remains were taken from Aberfoyle in a motor hearse to Ballachulish on Friday and interred that day in St. John’s Churchyard.

There was a large number of mourners present. Wreaths were sent from the employees at Aberfoyle and from others.

North Uist news

Miss Katie MacDonald, Glaic Schoolhouse, Carinish, has gained the dux medal for Gaelic, awarded by the Inverness Royal Academy, where she has been a student for the past five years.

She has also passed with distinction for her higher leaving certificate and now intends to prosecute her studies further afield with a view to qualifying for the teaching profession.